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Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
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https;//archive.org/details/storyofbible00vanl_0 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


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THE  OLD  AND  THE  NEW  TESTAMENT 


e  Stotq 

Tbe  Bibb 


IDrittcn.  and  Di?aiun.  btf 

flcndnltlDillcinUaivS^ 

and  I^Hisbcd  By 
Boni 


First  printing,  October,  1923 
Second  printing,  October,  1923 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Copyright,  1923,  By 
Boni  &  Liveright,  Inc. 

Copyright  in  All  Countries 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


To 


GEORGE  LINCOLN  BURR 


THE  BIBLE 


FOREWORD  FOR  HANSJE  AND 

WILLEM 


Dear  Boys : 

This  is  the  story  of  the  Bible.  I  have  written  it  because 
I  think  that  you  ought  to  know  more  about  the  Bible  than 
you  do,  and  I  really  could  not  tell  you  where  to  go  for  just 
the  sort  of  information  I  want  you  to  have.  Of  course,  I  might 
ask  you  to  read  the  original,  but  I  am  not  certain  that  you 
would.  For  many  years,  little  boys  of  your  age  have  been 
frightened  away  from  it  by  the  solemn  faces  and  forbidding 
attitude  of  those  who  believe  that  the  Holy  Volume  has  been 
entrusted  to  their  particular  care.  And  yet  you  never  can  be 
thoroughly  educated  without  knowing  these  stories.  Besides, 
at  one  time  or  another  in  your  lives,  you  may  badly  need  the 
wisdom  that  lies  hidden  in  these  ancient  chronicles. 

This  book  has  been  a  most  faithful  companion  of  man  for 
several  hundred  generations.  A  few  of  the  chapters  were 
written  as  long  as  twenty-eight  hundred  years  ago.  Others 
are  of  much  more  recent  date.  For  many  centuries,  it  was 
almost  the  only  book  your  ancestors  possessed  or  cared  to  read. 
They  knew  it  by  heart.  They  made  the  Law  of  Moses  the 
highest  law  of  the  land.  Then,  when  the  age  of  modern  science 
came,  there  arose  a  conflict  which  gave  rise  to  a  bitter  warfare 
between  those  who  held  the  book  to  be  of  Divine  origin,  and 
those  who  regarded  it  merely  as  an  account  of  certain  historical 


IX 


X 


FOREWORD 


events.  And  for  a  time,  the  Bible  was  hated  as  cordially  by 
many  men  and  many  women  as  it  had  been  loved  and  revered 
before  by  their  fathers  and  grandfathers. 

Of  all  this,  I  shall  tell  you  nothing. 

I  am  not  preaching  to  you.  I  am  not  defending  or  attack¬ 
ing  a  cause.  I  shall  merely  tell  you  what  you  ought  to  know 
(in  my  own  opinion — and  Heaven  forbid  that  I  should  ask 
others  to  agree!)  that  your  lives  may  be  more  full  of  under¬ 
standing,  of  tolerance  and  of  love  for  that  which  is  good  and 
beautiful,  and  therefore  holy. 

It  will  be  comparatively  easy  to  write  about  the  Old  Testa¬ 
ment.  It  is  the  story  of  a  certain  tribe  of  desert  people  who 
after  many  years  of  wandering,  finally  conquered  a  little  cor¬ 
ner  of  Western  Asia  where  they  settled  down,  and  founded  a 
nation  of  their  own.  Then  we  come  to  the  New  Testament. 
That  is  going  to  be  very  difficult.  The  New  Testament  centres 
around  one  single  figure.  It  tells  the  story  of  a  simple  car¬ 
penter  of  the  village  of  Nazareth,  who  asked  nothing  of  life  and 
gave  all.  There  may  be  other  stories  more  interesting  than 
that  of  Jesus,  but  I  have  never  read  any.  And  so  I  shall  give 
you  a  very  simple  account  of  his  life  as  I  see  it,  not  a  word 
more  and  not  a  word  less.  For  that,  I  am  sure,  is  the  way  he 
would  like  to  have  me  tell  it. 


Hendeik  Willem  van  Loon. 


CONTENTS 


PAGK 

1.  How  THE  Old  and  the  New  Testament  Came  to  Be  Written 

AND  What  Happened  to  the  Holy  Book  in  the  Course  of 
Many  Centuries  ........  3 

2.  How  THE  Jews  Believed  That  the  World  Had  Been  Created  12 

3.  The  Egyptian  Pyramids  Were  Ages  Old  When  the  Jews, 

Under  the  Leadership  of  Abraham,  Ventured  Forth  from 
THE  Outskirts  of  the  Stony  Desert  of  Arabia  and  Went 
Westward  to  Find  New  Pasturage  for  Their  Flocks  .  26 

4.  After  Many  Years  of  Wandering,  the  Jews  Found  a  New 

Home  in  the  Land  of  Egypt,  Where  their  Kinsman  Joseph 
Held  a  High  Political  Position  .....  50 

5.  But  the  Jews  Were  Originally  a  Simple  People  of  SIiep- 

herds,  and  City  Life  in  a  Foreign  Land  Was  Not  Good  for 
Them.  Rapidly  They  Became  Egyptianised  and  Instead 
OF  Being  Free  and  Independent  Men  and  Women,  They 

Became  Common  Labourers  Who  Worked  for  the  King  of _ 

Egypt  and  Who  Were  Treated  as  Slaves  ...  68 

6.  The  Situation  Grew  Worse  and  Worse  and  There  Seemed 

Little  Hope  That  Things  Would  Improve,  When  Moses, 

A  Very  Wise  Leader,  Decided  to  Take  His  People  Away 
from  a  Land  Where  They  Were  Merely  “Foreigners”  and 
TO  Lead  Them  to  a  New  Home  Where  They  Could  Found 
A  State  of  Their  Own  .......  72 

7.  Once  Again  the  Jews  Spent  Many  Years  in  the  Desert. 

Often  They  Lost  Hope,  But  Moses  Upheld  Their  Courage 
with  his  Vision  of  a  Promised  Land.  Moses  Taught  Them 
Many  Useful  Things,  but  Just  Before  He  Brought  Them 
TO  the  Land  Where  They  Hoped  to  Find  Freedom  and 
Independence,  He  Died 


83 


CONTENTS 


xii 

8.  The  Western  Part  of  Asia  Had  Been  Settled  for  Thousands 

OF  Years  and  the  Jews  Were  Forced  to  Fight  Many  Wars 
Before  They  Got  Hold  of  a  Piece  of  Land  Where  They 
Could  Found  a  National  State  and  Live  Under  the  Laws 
OF  Their  Own  Choice  and  Worship  Their  Own  God  as 
They  Had  Been  Taught  to  Do  by  Moses  .... 

9.  Under  a  Number  of  Energetic  Leaders,  a  Jewish  Nation  Was 

Finally  Established  in  the  Country  Which  Formerly 
Had  Belonged  to  the  Canaanites  ..... 

10.  The  Story  of  Ruth,  Which  Shows  Us  the  Simple  Charm  of 

the  Early  Life  in  Palestine  ...... 

11.  Saul  and  David  Were  Kings  of  an  Insignificant  Tribe  of 

Shepherds,  But  When  Solomon  Came  to  the  Throne,  the 
Jews  Had  Gained  Great  Importance  as  Traders  and  Mer¬ 
chants  and  in  Less  Than  a  Single  Century  the  Country 
Had  Been  Changed  From  a  Loose  Federation  of  Tribes 
INTO  A  Strong  State  Ruled  by  an  Oriental  Despot  . 

12.  A  Wise  Leader  Might  H)ave  Saved  This  Nation  from  the 

Fate  of  All  Empires.  The  Immediate  Successor  of  Solo¬ 
mon,  However,  Was  Indolent  and  Ignorant  and  Sur¬ 
rounded  BY  Evil  Advisors.  He  Forced  the  Ten  Northern 
Tribes  to  Rise  Up  in  Rebellion  Against  His  Misrule. 
They  Chose  a  King  of  Their  Own  and  Formed  a  New 
State,  Called  Israel.  The  Southern  Part  of  the  Coun¬ 
try  Remained  Faithful  to  the  Legitimate  Sovereign,  and 
It  Became  Known  as  Judah  and  Jerusalem  Was  Its  Capital 

13.  The  Two  Little  Jewish  Kingdoms  Were  Each  Other’s  Bit¬ 

terest  Enemies.  They  Made  War  upon  Each  Other  Al¬ 
most  Incessantly  and  This  Fraternal  Strife  So  Weakened 
Them  That  They  Were  Forever  at  the  Mercy  of  Their 
Neighbours.  Their  Final  Misfortunes,  However,  Did  Not 
Come  Without  a  Warning.  While  Kings  and  Politicians 
AND  Priests  Were  Neglecting  Their  Duties  as  Leaders  of 
THE  Nation,  a  Number  of  Courageous  Men,  Known  as  the 
Prophets,  Stepped  Forward  in  a  Vain  Attempt  to  Lead 
THE  People  Back  to  the  True  Worship  of  Jehovah  . 

14.  The  Jews  Refused  to  Listen  Until  a  Long  Period  of  Exile 

IN  Assyria  and  Babylonia  Brought  Them  to  a  R'ealisation 
OP  What  They  Had  Done  and  What  They  Ought  to  Have 


PAGE 

99 

113 

143 

148 


191 


201 


CONTENTS 


Done.  Far  Away  prom  the  Old  Home,  Scattered  Among 
THE  Towns  and  Villages  of  the  Valley  of  Mesopotamia, 
They  Began  That  Close  Study  of  the  Ancient  Laws  and 
THE  Early  Chronicles  Which  in  Due  Time  Was  to  Bring 
Them  Back  to  a  More  Sincere  and  Eager  Worship  of 
Jehovah  ......... 

16.  Meanwhile  a  Small  Tribe  of  Persian  Shepherds  Had  Gone 
ON  THE  Warpath  and  Had  Destroyed  the  Mighty  Empires 
OF  Western  Asia.  Cyrus,  the  Persian  King,  Allowed  the 
Jewish  Exiles  to  Return  to  Their  Own  Country,  The 
Majority  of  the  Jews,  However,  Were  Perfectly  Happy 
in  the  Comfortable  Babylonian  Cities  and  Remained 
Where  They  Were.  But  a  Small  Minority,  Which  Took 
Its  Religious  Duties  Seriously,  Returned  to  the  Ruins 
OF  Jerusalem,  Rebuilt  the  Temple  and  Made  It  the  Abso¬ 
lute  AND  Only  Centre  of  the  Worship  of  Jehovah  for  All 
THE  Jews  in  Every  Part  of  the  World  .... 

16.  The  Miscellaneous  Books  of  the  Old  Testament 

17.  But  While  These  Events  of  Which  We  Have  Just  Spoken 

Were  Taking  Place,  a  Great  Change  Had  Come  over  the 
World.  The  Genius  of  the  Greeks  Had  Set  the  World 
Free  from  Its  Ancient  Ignorance  and  Superstition.  The 
Foundation  Had  Been  Laid  for  Our  Modern  World  of 
Science  and  Art  and  Philosophy  and  Statecraft 

18.  A  Century  Later  a  Young  Macedonian  Chieftain,  Trained 

in  the  Best  Greek  Schools,  Decided  That  He  Must  Bring 
THE  Blessings  of  His  Adopted  Civilisation  to  All  Man¬ 
kind,  and  Conquered  Asia.  The  Country  of  the  Jews 
Was  Overrun  by  the  Armies  of  Alexander  and  Was 
Turned  into  a  Macedonian  Province.  After  His  Death, 
One  of  His  Generals  by  the  Name  of  Ptolemy  Made  Him¬ 
self  King  of  Egypt  and  the  Province  of  Palestine  Was 
Added  to  His  Possessions  ...... 

19.  Two  Hundred  Years  Later  a  Jewish  Family  by  the  Name  of 

THE  Maccabees  Began  a  Revolution  and  Tried  to  Set  the 
Country  Free  from  Foreign  Influence.  But  the  State 
Which  the  Maccabees  Tried  to  Found  Never  Flourished 
and  When  the  Romans  Conquered  Western  Asia  They 
Made  Palestine  a  Semi-Independent  Kingdom  and  Ap¬ 
pointed  One  of  Their  Political  Henchmen  to  Be  King 
OF  the  Unhappy  Land  ....... 


•  •  • 

XIll 

PAGE 


242 


257 

277 


285 


290 


297 


XIV 


CONTENTS 


20.  Now  It  Happened  During  the  Reign  of  One  of  Those  Kings, 

BY  THE  Name  of  Herod,  That  Mary,  the  Wife  of  Joseph 
THE  Carpenter  From  Nazareth,  Gave  Birth  to  a  Son  Who 
Was  Called  Joshua  by  His  Own  People  and  Jesus  by  His 
Greek  Neighbours  ....... 

21.  The  Prophetic  Spirit  Had  Not  Yet  Died  Out  Among  the 

Jews,  for  During  the  Days  of  Jesus*  Youth,  a  Man  by  the 
Name  of  John  (or  John  the  Baptist,  as  We  Came  to  Know 
Him)  Was  Warning  People  in  a  Thunderous  Voice  to  Re¬ 
pent  OF  Their  Crimes  and  of  Their  Sins.  The  Jews  Had 
No  Idea  of  Changing  Their  Ways.  When  John  Continued 
TO  Bother  the  People  of  Judaea  with  His  Sermons  and 
Exhortations,  Herod  the  King  Ordered  Him  to  Be  Killed 

22.  As  for  Jesus,  He  Grew  Up  Among  the  Simple  Peasants  and 

Artisans  of  a  Little  Village  Called  Nazareth.  He  Was 
Taught  the  Trade  of  a  Carpenter,  but  This  Life  Did  Not 
Satisfy  Him.  He  Looked  upon  the  World  and  Found  It 
Full  of  Cruelty  and  Injustice.  He  Left  His  Father  and 
His  Mother  and  His  Brothers  and  His  Sisters,  and  Went 
Forth  to  Tell  of  Those  Things  Which  in  His  Heart  He 
Held  to  Be  True  ........ 

23.  From  Village  to  Village  He  Wandered.  He  Talked  to  All 

Sorts  and  Conditions  of  People.  Men,  Women  and  Chil¬ 
dren  Came  to  Listen  Eagerly  to  the  New  Words  of  Good- 
Will  AND  Charity  and  Love.  They  Called  Jesus  Their 
Master  and  Followed  Him  Wherever  He  Went  as  His 
Faithful  Disciples  ....... 

24.  Soon  It  Became  Known  All  over  the  Land  That  Here  Was 

A  Prophet  Who  Taught  the  Strange  Doctrine  That  All 
the  People  of  This  Earth  (and  Not  Only  the  Jews)  Were 
THE  Children  of  One  Loving  God,  and  Therefore  Brothers 
AND  Sisters  to  Each  Other  and  to  All  Mankind 

25.  Of  Course  Those  Who  Profited  From  the  Existing  Order 

OF  Things  (and  There  Were  Many)  Did  Not  Like  to  Hear 
Such  Doctrines  Publicly  Proclaimed.  They  Declared 
That  the  New  Prophet  W^as  a  Dangerous  Enemy  to  All 
Established  Law  and  Order.  Soon  These  Enemies  of 
Jesus  Made  Common  Cause.  They  Set  to  Work  to  Bring 
About  His  Destruction  ....•• 


PAGE 


323 


344 


356 


361 


367 


378 


CONTENTS 


XV 


26.  The  Roman  Governor  Before  Whom  the  Case  of  Jesus  Was 

Laid  Did  Not  Care  What  Happened  as  Long  as  an  Outward 
Semblance  of  Peace  and  Tranquillity  Was  Maintained 
Within  His  Province.  He  Allowed  Jesus  to  Be  Con¬ 
demned  to  Death  ........ 

27.  But  the  New  Words  of  Love  and  Hope  Which  Had  Been 

Whispered  into  the  Ears  of  an  Unhappy  Humanity  Could 
Not  Be  Suppressed  by  the  Acts  of  Roman  Governors  and 
Envious  Jewish  Priests.  Nay,  Not  Even  the  Emperor 
Himself  Could  Prevent  the  Disciples  of  Jesus  from  Car¬ 
rying  the  Message  of  Their  Master  to  All  Those  Who 
Cared  to  Listen  ........ 

28.  One  Thing,  However,  Was  Necessary  Before  Christianity 

Could  Become  a  World-Religion.  There  Had  to  Be  a 
Break  With  Jerusalem  and  the  Narrow  Tribal  Prejudices 
OF  THE  Older  Faith.  A  Brilliant  Speaker  and  Organiser 
BY  the  Name  of  Paul  Saved  Christianity  from  the  Fate 
OF  Degeneration  into  Another  Little  Jewish  Sect.  Paul 
Left  Judaea,  Crossed  Over  into  Europe  and  Made  the  New 
Church  an  International  Institution  Which  Recognised 
No  Difference  Between  Jew  and  Roman  and  Greek 

29.  Shortly  Afterwards,  Another  Disciple  by  the  Name  of 

Peter  Went  to  Rome  to  Visit  the  Small  Colony  of  Chris¬ 
tians  ON  THE  Banks  of  the  Tiber.  He  Himself  Perished 
During  One  of  the  Many  Pogroms  Organised  by  the  Em¬ 
perors  When  They  Began  to  Fear  the  Influence  of  This 
New  Religious  Organisation.  But  the  Church  Easily 
Survived  Those  Attacks.  Three  Centuries  Later,  When 
Rome  Ceased  to  Be  the  Political  Centre  of  the  Western 
World,  the  Christian  Bishops  of  the  City  Made  Their 
Residence  the  Spiritual  Capital  of  the  Entire  World 

30.  Animated  Chronology  ....... 

31.  A  Biblical  Reading  List  for  Children — Selected  by  Leonore 

St.  John  Power  .  .  .  .  .  ’  . 


PAOK 

387 

413 


417 


428 

437 

440 


32.  Index 


447 


LIST  OF  COLORED  PICTURES 


The  Old  and  the  New  Testament . Frontispiece 

Facing  page 

The  Jewish  Story  of  Creation . 12 

Abraham’s  Last  Home  in  the  Desert . 28 

Slavery . 62 

The  Desert . 84 

The  Captives . 238 

Judas  Maeeabee . 306 

Bethlehem  .  3^ 

The  Unknown  Prophet . 350 

Jesus  Crosses  to  a  Foreign  Land  ........  388 

The  Pharisee  and  His  Vietim . . 

St.  Paul  Goes  Abroad  .  .  .  .  * . 422 

The  Church  Conquers  the  Temple  ........  434 

BLACK  AND  WHITE  DRAWINGS 

The  Last  Supper . . 

Jesus  Is  Taken  Before  Herod . 4O4 

The  Church  Goes  Underground . . 


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LIST  OF  PICTURES 


PAGE 

1.  Let  There  Be  Land . 14 

2.  The  Sun,  the  Moon  and  the  Stars . 15 

3.  The  First  Sabbath . 16 

4.  The  Death  of  Abel . 18 

5.  The  Building  of  the  Ark . 20 

6.  It  Began  to  Rain . 22 

7.  The  Altar . 23 

8.  The  Rainbow . 23 

9.  The  Tower  of  Babel . 24 

10.  Abraham  Builds  an  Altar . 28 

11.  Abraham  and  Lot  Reach  River  Jordan . 29 

12.  Lot’s  Wife  Is  Turned  into  a  Pillar  of  Salt . 32 

13.  The  Philistines  Land  on  the  Coast  of  Palestine  ....  33 

14.  Abraham  Built  Himself  a  Home  in  the  New  Country  ...  34 

15.  Hagar’s  Flight . 35 

16.  Abraham  Sacrifices  Isaac  ........  37 

17.  The  Burial  of  Sarah . 38 

18.  Rebekah’s  Well . 39 

19.  Esau  Has  Lost  His  Birthright  .......  44 


XX 


LIST  OF  PICTURES 


20.  Jacob  Flees  When  Esau  Returns  Home . 

21.  Jacob’s  Dream . 

22.  Joseph’s  First  Dream  of  the  Sheaves . 

23.  Joseph’s  Second  Dream  of  the  Stars . 

24.  Joseph  Is  Proud  in  His  New  Coat . 

25.  The  Brethren  Threw  Joseph  into  a  Deep,  Dark  Pit  . 

26.  Joseph,  Although  Innocent,  Thrown  into  Prison  .... 

27.  Joseph  Is  Taken  Before  Pharaoh . 

28.  Joseph  Explains  Pharaoh’s  Dream . 

29.  Joseph  Builds  Vast  Storehouses  for  Grain  That  Is  Plentiful 

30.  Famine  Stalked  Through  the  Land  of  Egypt  .  .  .  . 

31.  Joseph’s  Brethren  Travelled  to  Egypt  to  Ask  for  Grain 

32.  Jacob  Was  Laid  to  Rest  in  the  Ancestral  Cave  of  Machpelah  . 

33.  The  Jews  Came  to  Like  the  Busy  Luxury  of  the  Big  Cities  . 

34.  The  Child  Moses  Was  Left  to  the  Mercies  of  the  River  . 

35.  In  the  Solitude  of  the  Old  Desert  Moses  Found  His  Soul  . 

36.  Then  the  Plague  Visited  the  Peaceful  Villages  of  the  Land  of 

Egypt . .  . 

37.  A  Terrible  Wave  Destroyed  Pharaoh  and  His  Armies  . 

38.  Moses  Struck  on  Rock  and  the  Water  Gushed  Forth  . 

39.  The  Jews  Pitched  Camp  at  the  Foot  of  the  Mount  Called  Sinai 

40.  Moses  Found  the  Jews  Worshipping  the  Image  of  a  Golden  Calf 

41.  Amidst  the  Thunder  of  Mt.  Sinai’s  Highest  Top  Moses  Received 

the  Sacred  Commandments . 

42.  A  High  Pillar  of  Clouds  Had  Guided  the  Jews  Through  the 

Desert  ............ 

43.  The  Pillar  of  Cloud  Came  to  Rest  on  the  Ark  .... 


46 

47 

52 

53 

54 

55 
57 
60 
61 
62 

63 

64 
66 
70 
74 
76 

79 


82 


86 


88 


89 

91 

93 

94 


LIST  OF  PICTURES  xxi 

PAGE 

44.  The  Spies  Reported  That  They  Had  Found  a  Most  Fertile  Land  96 

46.  At  Last  Moses  Was  Allowed  to  See  the  Promised  Land  .  .  96 

46.  The  Dead  Sea . 97 

47.  The  Glow  of  the  Jewish  Watch-Fires  Was  Seen  Far  and  Wide  100 

48.  The  Spies  Escape  from  the  House  of  Rahab  .  .  .  ,102 

49.  The  Ford  Across  the  Jordan . 103 

60.  The  Jewish  Army  Marches  Around  the  Walls  of  Jericho  .  .104 

61.  The  Walls  of  Jericho  Fall  Down . 106 

62.  The  People  of  Ai  Had  Seen  the  Fate  of  Jericho  ....  107 

63.  The  Gibeonites  Come  to  Joshua  in  an  Exhausted  Condition  .  108 

54.  The  Kings  Are  Imprisoned  in  the  Cave . 110 

55.  The  Sun  Stands  Still . Ill 

56.  The  Jews  Feared  the  Strongholds  of  the  Men  of  Anak  .  .  115 

57.  The  Tomb  of  the  Giant  Anakim . 116 

58.  The  Frontier  Between  the  Lands  of  the  Jews  and  the  Philistines  118 

59.  The  Philistines  Land  in  Philistia  or  Palestine  .  .  .  .119 

60.  The  Lonely  House  of  Deborah  the  Prophetess  .  .  ,  .121 

61.  Micah  Built  Himself  a  Temple  with  a  Strange  Idol  in  It  .  .  123 

62.  Gideon  Destroys  the  Altar  of  Baal  .  .  .  .  .  .125 

63.  The  Jews  Watched  the  Midianites  Leaving  Their  Homes  .  .126 

64.  The  Attack  of  Gideon’s  Men . 127 

65.  Abimelech  Burns  the  Town  of  Shechem . 128 

66.  The  Ephraimites  Are  Made  to  Pronounce  Shibboleth  .  .  .130 

67.  Jephthah  Returns  Home  and  Is  Met  by  His  Daughter  .  .  131 

68.  Samson  Carries  Away  the  Gates  .  .  .  .  .  .  .135 

69.  Samson  at  Work  in  the  Mill  .  .137 


XXII 


LIST  OF  PICTURES 


PAGE 

70.  The  Death  of  Samson . 138 

71.  The  Ark  Is  Returned . 141 

72.  Ruth  and  Naomi  Leave  for  the  Old  Home . 144 

73.  Ruth . 145 

74.  Naomi  Bids  Farewell  to  Ruth . 146 

75.  The  Prophet  Became  the  Concrete  Expression  of  the  National 

Conscience . 151 

76.  Woe  unto  the  Town  That  Listened  Not  to  the  Voice  of  the 

Prophet . 152 

77.  David  Brings  Back  Goliath’s  Head . 160 

78.  Saul  Enters  the  Cave  of  David . 164 

79.  The  Burial  of  Saul . '  .  .170 

80.  David  Takes  the  Shield  and  Spear  of  Abner  .  .  .  .171 

81.  The  Death  of  Absalom . 179 

82.  The  Altar  of  Burned  Offering  Stood  Out  in  the  Open  .  .  .183 

83.  The  Holy  of  Holies . 186 

84.  Elijah  Appears  Suddenly  Outside  the  Gate  of  Ahab’s  Palace  •  217 

85.  The  Brook  Cherith . 218 

86.  Elijah’s  Sacrifice . 219 

87.  Elijah  in  the  Midst  of  an  Earthquake . 222 

88.  Elijah  Hears  One  Voice  in  the  Desert . 223 

89.  Naboth’s  Vineyard . 224 

90.  A  Little  Pile  of  Stones  by  One  Side  of  the  Wall  Showed  Where 

Ahab  Was  Buried . 226 

91.  Jehu  Drives  His  Chariot  Across  the  Body  of  Jezebel  .  .  229 

92.  Jeremiah  on  the  Walls  of  Jerusalem . 240 

93.  Babylon . 243 


LIST  OF  PICTURES  xxiil 


PACE 


94. 

Daniel  Deciphers  the  Mysterious  Letter 

264 

95. 

Hainan’s  Plot  to  Murder  the  Jews 

274 

96. 

Haman  Hanged  on  His  Own  Gallows 

275 

97. 

The  Jews  in  Exile  .... 

276 

98. 

The  World  of  the  Greeks 

288 

99. 

Jerusalem  Stood  Forgotten  . 

289 

100. 

Zarathustra . 

291 

101. 

Jerusalem  Surrendered  on  One  Sabbath  Day  Without 

a  Fight 

295 

102. 

Once  More  Jerusalem  Was  Taken 

302 

103. 

The  Home  of  Mattathias 

304 

104. 

The  Essenes  Lived  in  the  Wilderness 

312 

106. 

Josephus . 

325 

106. 

Herod . 

332 

107. 

Nazareth . 

333 

108. 

Joseph . 

334 

109. 

Zacharias . 

335 

110. 

Mary . 

336 

111. 

On  the  Way  to  Bethlehem  . 

337 

112. 

The  Nativity . 

338 

113. 

The  Shepherds  .... 

339 

114. 

The  Adoration . 

340 

115. 

Herod’s  Gloomy  Palace  . 

341 

116. 

Simeon  and  Anna  .... 

342 

117. 

Murder  in  Bethlehem 

343 

118. 

The  Roman  Guard  .... 

• 

347 

119. 

John  the  Baptist  in  the  Desert  . 

• 

349 

XXIV 


LIST  OF  PICTURES 


PAGE 

120.  The  Dead  Sea . 360 

121.  John  the  Baptist . 351 

122.  Jesus  in  the  Wilderness . 362 

123.  The  Underground  Dungeon  ........  353 

124.  John  Was  Taken  Out  of  His  Dungeon . 354 

125.  Jesus  Leaves  Home . 360 

126.  Bethlehem . 363 

127.  Cana . 364 

128.  The  Wedding  at  Cana  .  .  365 

129.  Capernaum . 368 

130.  Andrew  and  Peter . .  .  .  .  369 

131.  The  Money-Changer . 370 

132.  Jesus  Drives  Away  the  Money-Changers . 371 

133.  Nicodemus . 372 

134.  The  Pharisee  and  the  Samaritan . 373 

135.  Caesarea . 374 

136.  Jesus  and  the  Samaritan  Woman . 375 

137.  The  Lame,  the  Halt  and  the  Blind . 376 

138.  The  Pool  of  Bethsaida . 379 

139.  The  Sanhedrin  Meets . 380 

140.  The  Sermon  on  the  Mount . 383 

141.  The  Deserted  Farm . 388 

142.  The  Merchants  of  Jerusalem . 389 

143.  Jesus  Enters  Jerusalem . 390 

144.  Jesus  Eats  with  a  Foreigner . 392 

145.  The  Fanatic . 394 


LIST  OF  PICTURES 


XXV 


PAGE 


146. 

The  Reward  .... 

• 

• 

• 

.  398 

147. 

Judas  . 

.  399 

148. 

The  Garden  of  Gethsemane  . 

.  401 

149. 

Gethsemane  .... 

.  402 

150. 

Caiaphas  and  Annas 

.  403 

151. 

Peter  Denies  Jesus 

.  405 

152. 

Pontius  Pilate  .... 

.  406 

153. 

Jesus  Is  Taken  to  Prison 

• 

• 

• 

.  407 

154. 

Golgotha  ..... 

.  408 

155. 

The  Road  to  Golgotha  . 

.  410 

156. 

The  Death  of  Jesus  . 

.  411 

157. 

St.  Stephen  .... 

.  418 

158. 

Damascus  .... 

.  419 

159. 

Antioch  ..... 

.  420 

160. 

The  Apostle  .... 

« 

• 

• 

.  421 

161. 

Troas  ..... 

.  422 

162. 

The  Temple  of  Diana  . 

.  423 

163. 

Paul  Returns  to  the  Temple  . 

• 

• 

• 

.  425 

164. 

Paul  Goes  to  Rome  . 

.  426 

165. 

Malta  ..... 

166. 

St.  Peter . 

.  429 

167. 

The  Slave  .... 

.  431 

168. 

Rome  Burned  .... 

.  433 

169. 

Rome  the  Spiritual  Centre 

• 

• 

• 

.  435 

THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


I 


•V 


A  LITERARY  INHERITANCE 


CHAPTER  I 

HOW  THE  OLD  AND  THE  NEW  TESTAMENT  CAME  TO 
BE  WRITTEN  AND  WHAT  HAPPENED  TO  THE  HOLY 
BOOK  IN  THE  COURSE  OF  MANY  CENTURIES 

IE  pyramids  were  a  thousand  years  old. 

Babylon  and  Nineveh  had  become  the 
centres  of  vast  empires. 

The  valley  of  the  Nile  and  that  of  the 
broad  Euphrates  and  Tigris  were  filled 
with  swarming  masses  of  busy  people, 
when  a  small  tribe  of  desert  wanderers, 
for  reasons  of  their  own,  decided  to  leave 
their  home  along  the  sandy  wastes  of  the  Arabian  desert,  and 
began  to  travel  northward  in  search  of  more  fertile  fields. 

In  time  to  come,  these  wanderers  were  to  be  known  as 
the  Jews. 

Centuries  later,  they  were  to  give  us  the  most  important 
of  all  our  books,  the  Bible. 

Still  later,  one  of  their  women  was  to  give  birth  to  the 
kindest  and  greatest  of  all  teachers. 

And  yet,  curious  to  say,  we  know  nothing  of  the  origin 

3 


4 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


of  those  strange  folk,  who  came  from  nowhere,  who  played 
the  greatest  role  ever  allotted  to  the  race  of  man,  and  then 
departed  from  the  historical  stage  to  become  exiles  among  the 
nations  of  the  world. 

What  I  shall  therefore  tell  you  in  this  chapter  is  somewhat 
vague  in  its  general  character  and  none  too  reliable  as  to  detail. 

But  the  archaeologists  are  busily  digging  in  the  soil  of 
Palestine.  They  are  learning  more  and  more  as  time  goes  by. 

A  few  facts  are  at  our  disposal,  and  of  these  I  shall  try 
to  give  you  a  trustworthy  account. 

Through  the  western  part  of  Asia  run  two  broad  rivers. 

They  take  their  origin  among  the  high  mountains  of  the 
north.  Thev  lose  themselves  in  the  waters  of  the  Persian  Gulf. 

Along  the  banks  of  those  two  muddy  streams,  life  was  very 
agreeable  and  quite  lazy.  Therefore  the  people  who  inhabited 
either  the  cold  mountains  of  the  north  or  the  scorching  desert 
of  the  south  all  tried  to  get  a  foothold  in  the  valleys  of  the 
Tigris  and  the  Euphrates.  Whenever  they  had  a  chance,  they 
left  their  old  homes  and  wandered  into  the  fertile  plain. 

They  fought  each  other  and  conquered  each  other,  and 
founded  one  civilisation  right  on  top  of  the  ruins  of  another 
that  had  gone  before.  They  built  large  cities  like  Babylon  and 
Nineveh,  and  more  than  forty  centuries  ago  they  turned  this 
part  of  the  world  into  a  veritable  paradise,  the  inhabitants 
of  which  were  envied  by  all  other  men. 

But  when  you  look  at  the  map  you  will  see  many  millions 
of  busy  little  peasants  tilling  the  fields  of  another  powerful 
country.  They  live  on  the  banks  of  the  Nile  and  their  country 
is  called  Egypt.  They  are  separated  from  Babylonia  and 
Assyria  by  a  narrow  strip  of  land.  There  are  many  things 
which  they  need  and  which  they  can  obtain  only  in  the  distant 
countries  of  the  fertile  plain.  There  are  many  things  which 


A  LITERARY  INHERITANCE 


5 


the  Babylonians  and  the  Assyrians  need,  and  which  are  manu¬ 
factured  only  in  Egypt.  The  two  nations  therefore  trade 
with  one  another,  and  the  highroad  of  commerce  runs  through 
the  narrow  strip  of  land  which  we  have  just  mentioned. 

Nowadays  we  call  that  part  of  the  world  Syria.  In  olden 
days  it  was  known  by  many  names.  It  is  composed  of  low 
mountains  and  broad  valleys.  It  has  few  trees,  and  the  soil 
is  baked  by  the  sun.  But  a  number  of  small  lakes  and  many 
little  brooks  add  a  touch  of  loveliness  to  the  sombre  monotony 
of  the  rocky  hills. 

From  the  earliest  times  on,  this  region  of  the  ancient  high¬ 
roads  has  been  inhabited  by  different  tribes,  who  have  moved 
hither  from  the  Arabian  desert.  They  all  belong  to  the  Semitic 
race.  They  all  speak  an  identical  language.  They  worship 
the  same  gods.  Often  they  fight  each  other.  Then  they  make 
treaties  of  peace  with  each  other,  and  fight  each  other  again. 
They  steal  each  other’s  cities  and  each  other’s  wives  and  each 
other’s  flocks,  and  generally  behave  as  such  wandering  tribes 
will  behave  when  there  is  no  higher  authority  in  the  land  than 
the  violence  of  their  own  will  and  the  strength  of  their  own 
good  sword. 

In  a  vague  way  they  recognise  the  authority  of  the  Kings 
of  Egypt  or  the  Kings  of  Babylonia  or  Assyria.  When  the 
tax-collectors  of  those  mighty  potentates  come  down  the  road 
with  their  armed  retinue  of  men,  the  quarrelling  herdsmen 
become  very  humble.  With  many  profound  bows,  they 
acknowledge  themselves  the  obedient  servants  of  the  Pharaoh 
of  Memphis  or  the  King  of  Akkad.  But  when  His  Excellency, 
the  Governor,  together  with  his  soldiers,  has  gone,  then  the  old 
life  of  tribal  warfare  continues  as  merrily  as  before. 

Please  do  not  take  these  struggles  too  seriously.  They  were 
the  only  outdoor  sport  these  ancient  people  could  enjoy,  and 


6 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


the  damage  done  was  usually  very  slight.  Besides,  it  kept  the 
young  men  in  good  trim. 

The  Jews,  who  were  to  play  such  a  great  role  in  the  history 
of  the  human  race,  began  their  career  as  one  of  the  quarrelling, 
fighting,  wandering,  stealing  little  tribes  who  were  trying  to 
maintain  themselves  in  the  land  of  the  High  Roads.  Unfortu¬ 
nately,  we  really  know  next  to  nothing  of  the  beginning  of  their 
history.  Many  learned  men  have  made  many  learned  guesses. 
But  a  plausible  guess  does  not  fill  an  historic  gap.  And  when 
we  read  that  the  Jews  originally  came  from  the  land  of  Ur  on 
the  Persian  Gulf,  this  may  be  true,  but  also  it  may  be  false. 
Rather  than  tell  you  many  things  which  were  not  so,  I  tell  you 
nothing  at  all,  and  only  mention  a  very  few  facts,  upon  which 
all  historians  agree. 

The  earliest  ancestors  of  the  Jews  probably  lived  in  the 
desert  of  Arabia.  We  do  not  know  in  what  century  they  left 
their  old  homesteads,  that  they  might  enter  the  fertile  plain  of 
western  Asia.  We  know  that  they  wandered  for  many  cen¬ 
turies,  trying  to  get  hold  of  a  bit  of  land  which  they  could  call 
their  own,  but  the  road  which  thev  followed  has  been  lost.  We 
also  know  that  at  one  time  or  another,  the  Jews  crossed  the 
desert  of  Mount  Sinai  and  that  they  lived  for  a  while  in  Egypt. 

From  that  moment  on,  however,  Egyptian  and  Assyrian 
texts  begin  to  throw  some  light  upon  the  events  which  are 
enumerated  in  the  Old  Testament. 

The  rest  of  the  story  became  a  familiar  tale — ^how  the  Jews 
left  Egypt  and  after  an  endless  trek  in  the  desert,  were  united 
into  a  strong  tribe — how  that  tribe  conquered  a  small  part  of 
the  land  of  the  High  Roads,  called  Palestine,  and  there  estab¬ 
lished  a  nation,  and  how  that  nation  fought  for  its  independence 
and  survived  several  centuries  until  it  was  absorbed  by  the 
empire  of  the  Macedonian  King,  Alexander,  and  was  then 


A  LITERARY  INHERITANCE 


7 


turned  into  part  of  one  of  the  minor  provinces  of  the  great 
Roman  state. 

But  when  I  mention  these  historical  occurrences,  bear  one 
thing  in  mind.  This  time,  I  am  not  writing  a  book  of  history. 
I  am  not  going  to  tell  you  what  (according  to  the  best  his¬ 
torical  information)  actually  happened.  I  am  going  to  try 
to  show  you  how  a  certain  people,  called  the  Jews,  thought 
that  certain  things  had  happened. 

As  you  all  know,  there  is  a  great  deal  of  difference  between 
the  things  that  ‘‘are  facts”  and  the  things  which  we  “believe 
to  be  facts.”  Every  text-book  of  history  of  every  land  tells 
the  story  of  the  past  as  the  people  of  that  particular  country 
believe  it  to  be  true,  but  when  you  cross  the  frontier  and  read 
the  text-book  of  the  nearest  neighbour,  you  will  therein  find  a 
very  different  account.  Yet  the  little  children  who  read  those 
chapters  will  believe  them  to  be  true  until  the  end  of  their  days. 

Here  and  there,  of  course,  an  historian  or  a  philosopher 
or  another  queer  person  will  read  all  the  books  of  all  the  coun¬ 
tries,  and  perhaps  he  will  come  to  an  appreciation  of  something 
that  approaches  the  absolute  truth.  But  if  he  wishes  to  lead 
a  peaceful  and  happy  life,  he  will  keep  this  information  to 
himself. 

What  is  true  of  the  rest  of  the  world  is  also  true  of  the 
Jews.  The  Jews  of  thirty  centuries  ago  and  those  of  twenty 
centuries  ago  and  those  of  to-day  are  ordinary  human  beings, 
just  as  you  and  I.  They  are  no  better  (as  they  sometimes 
claim)  and  no  worse  (as  their  enemies  often  state)  than  any 
one  else.  They  possess  certain  virtues  which  are  very  uncom¬ 
mon,  and  they  also  have  certain  faults  which  are  exceedingly 
common.  But  so  much  has  been  written  about  them,  good, 
bad  and  indifferent,  that  it  is  very  difficult  to  come  to  a  correct 
estimate  of  their  just  place  in  history. 


8 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


We  experience  the  same  difficulty  when  we  try  to  learn  the 
historical  value  of  the  chronicles  which  the  Jews  themselves 
kept  and  which  tell  us  their  adventures  among  the  men  of 
Egypt  and  among  the  men  of  the  land  of  Canaan  and  among 
the  men  of  the  land  of  Babylonia. 

Newcomers  are  rarely  popular.  In  most  of  the  countries 
which  the  Jews  visited  during  their  endless  years  of  peregrina¬ 
tion,  thev  were  newcomers.  The  old  and  settled  inhabitants 
of  the  vallevs  of  the  Nile  and  of  the  dales  of  Palestine  and  those 
who  lived  along  the  banks  of  the  Euphrates  did  not  receive 
them  with  open  arms.  On  the  contrary,  they  said,  “We  have 
hardly  room  for  our  own  sons  and  daughters.  Let  those 
foreigners  go  elsewhere.”  Then  there  was  trouble. 

When  the  Jewish  historians  looked  back  upon  those  ancient 
days,  they  tried  to  place  their  own  ancestors  in  the  best  possible 
light.  Nowadays  we  do  the  same  thing.  We  praise  the  virtues 
of  the  Puritan  settlers  of  Massachusetts  and  we  describe  the 
horrors  of  those  first  years  when  the  poor  white  man  was 
forever  exposed  to  the  cruel  arrow  of  the  savage.  But  we 
rarely  mention  the  fate  of  the  red  man,  who  was  exposed  to 
the  equally  cruel  bullet  of  the  white  man’s  blunderbuss. 

An  honest  history,  written  from  the  point  of  view  of  the 
Indians,  would  make  mighty  interesting  reading.  But  the 
Indian  is  dead  and  gone,  and  we  shall  never  know  how  the 
coming  of  the  foreigners  in  the  year  1620  impressed  him. 
Which  is  a  pity. 

For  many  centuries,  the  Old  Testament  was  the  only  history 
of  old  Asia  which  our  grandfathers  could  decipher  and  under¬ 
stand.  But  a  century  ago,  we  began  to  learn  how  to  read  the 
hieroglyphics  of  Egypt,  and  fifty  years  ago  we  discovered 
the  key  to  the  mysterious  nail- writing  of  Babylon.  We  now 


A  LITERARY  INHERITANCE 


9 


know  that  there  was  a  very  different  side  to  the  stories  which 
were  related  by  the  old  Jewish  chronicle  writers. 

We  see  them  commit  the  mistakes  of  all  patriotic  historians 
and  we  understand  how  they  perverted  the  truth  to  increase 
the  glory  and  the  splendour  of  their  own  race. 

All  this,  however  (I  repeat  it),  does  not  properly  belong 

in  my  book.  I  am  not  writing  a  history  of  the  Jewish  people. 
I  am  not  defending  them,  or  attacking  their  motives.  I  am 
merely  repeating  their  own  version  of  ancient  Asiatic  and 
African  history.  I  shall  not  study  the  critical  texts  of  learned 
historians.  A  little  Bible,  bought  for  a  dime,  will  provide  me 
with  all  the  material  I  can  possibly  need. 

If  you  had  used  the  word  “Bible”  to  a  Jew  of  the  first 
century  of  our  era,  he  would  not  have  known  what  you 
were  talking  about.  The  word  is  comparatively  new.  It  was 
invented  in  the  fourth  century  by  John  Chrysostom,  the  patri¬ 
arch  of  Constantinople,  who  referred  to  the  general  collection 
of  Holy  Books  of  the  Jews  as  the  “Biblia”  or  the  “Books.” 

This  collection  had  been  growing  steadily  for  almost  a 
thousand  years.  With  a  few  exceptions,  the  chapters  had  all 
been  written  in  Hebrew.  But  Hebrew  was  no  longer  a  spoken 
language  when  Jesus  was  born.  Aramaic  (much  simpler  and 
widely  known  among  the  common  people)  had  taken  its  place 
and  several  of  the  prophetic  utterances  of  the  Old  Testament 
were  written  in  that  language.  But  please  don’t  ask  me  “when 
the  Bible  was  written,”  because  I  could  not  answer  you. 

Every  little  Jewish  village  and  every  little  Jewish  temple 
possessed  certain  accounts  of  its  own  which  had  been  copied 
on  the  skins  of  animals  or  on  bits  of  Egyptian  papyrus  by 
pious  old  men,  who  took  an  interest  in  such  things.  Sometimes 
small  collections  were  made  of  different  laws  and  of  prophecies 
for  handy  use  among  those  who  visited  the  temple. 


10 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


During  the  eighth  century  B.  C.,  when  the  Jews  had  settled 
down  to  their  life  in  Palestine,  those  compilations  grew  larger 
and  larger.  At  some  time  or  other  between  the  third  and  the 
first  century  before  our  era,  they  were  translated  into  the 
Greek  language,  and  were  brought  to  Europe.  Since  then 
they  have  been  translated  into  every  language  of  the  world. 

As  for  the  New  Testament,  its  history  is  quite  simple.  Dur¬ 
ing  the  first  two  or  three  centuries  after  the  death  of  Christ, 
the  followers  of  the  humble  carpenter  of  Nazareth  were  forever 
in  danger  of  trouble  with  the  Roman  authorities.  The  doctrines 
of  love  and  charity  were  thought  to  be  very  dangerous  to  the 
safety  of  the  Roman  state,  which  had  been  founded  upon  the 
brute  strength  of  the  sword.  The  early  Christians,  therefore, 
could  not  go  to  a  book  store  and  say:  “Please  give  me  a  ‘Life 
of  Christ’  and  an  account  of  the  acts  of  his  Apostles.”  They 
got  their  information  from  secret  little  pamphlets  which  were 
passed  from  hand  to  hand.  Thousands  of  such  pamphlets  were 
copied  and  re-copied,  until  people  lost  all  track  of  the  truth 
of  their  contents. 

Meanwhile,  the  Church  had  been  triumphant.  The  perse¬ 
cuted  Christians  became  the  rulers  of  the  old  Roman  state. 
First  of  all  they  brought  some  order  into  the  literary  chaos 
caused  by  three  centuries  of  persecution.  The  (head  of  the) 
Church  called  together  a  number  of  learned  men.  They  read 
all  the  accounts  which  were  popular,  and  discarded  most  of 
them.  They  decided  to  keep  a  few  of  the  gospels  and  a  few 
of  the  letters  which  had  been  written  by  the  Apostles  to  the 
members  of  distant  congregations.  All  the  other  stories  were 
discarded. 

Then  followed  several  centuries  of  discussion  and  dispute. 
Many  famous  Synods  were  held  in  Rome  and  in  Carthage 
(a  new  city  built  upon  the  ruins  of  the  famous  old  seaport) 


A  LITERARY  INHERITANCE 


11 


and  in  Trullo,  and  seven  hundred  years  after  the  death  of 
Christ  the  New  Testament  (as  we  know  it)  was  definitely 
adopted  by  the  Churches  of  the  East  and  by  those  of  the  West. 
Since  then  there  have  been  countless  translations  made  from 
the  original  Greek,  but  no  very  important  changes  have  oc¬ 
curred  in  the  text. 


CREATION 


CHAPTER  II 

HOW  THE  JEWS  BELIEVED  THAT  THE  WORLD  HAD 

BEEN  CREATED 

HE  oldest  of  all  questions  is  this :  “Where 
do  we  come  from?” 

Some  people  ask  it  until  the  very  day 
of  their  death.  They  do  not  really 
expect  to  get  an  answer,  but  they  are 
happy  in  the  courage  that  makes  them 
face  the  realities  of  life,  and  like  brave 
soldiers,  facing  a  hopeless  task,  they 
refuse  to  surrender  and  they  pass  into  eternity  with  the  proud 
word  “why”  upon  their  lips. 

This  world,  however,  is  full  of  all  sorts  of  men  and  women. 
Most  of  them  insist  upon  a  plausible  explanation  of  the  things 
which  they  do  not  understand.  When  no  explanation  is  forth¬ 
coming,  they  invent  one  of  their  own. 

Five  thousand  years  ago  a  story  which  told  of  the  creation 
of  this  world  in  seven  days  was  common  among  all  the  people 
of  western  Asia.  And  this  was  the  Jewish  version  of  it. 

They  vaguely  attributed  the  making  of  the  land  and  of  the 

12 


THE  JEWISH  STORY  OF  CREATION 


CREATION 


13 


sea  and  of  the  trees  and  the  flowers  and  the  birds  and  of  man 
and  woman  to  their  different  gods. 

But  it  happened  that  the  Jews  were  the  first  among  all 
people  to  recognise  the  existence  of  One  Single  God.  After¬ 
wards  when  we  come  to  talk  of  the  days  of  Moses,  we  shall 
tell  you  how  this  came  about. 

In  the  beginning,  however,  the  particular  Semitic  tribe 
which  later  was  to  develop  into  the  Jewish  nation,  worshipped 
several  divinities,  just  as  all  their  neighbours  had  done  before 
them  for  countless  ages. 

The  stories  of  the  creation,  however,  which  we  find  in  the 
Old  Testament,  were  written  more  than  a  thousand  years  after 
the  death  of  Moses,  when  the  idea  of  One  God  had  been 
accepted  by  the  Jews  as  an  absolutely  established  fact,  and 
when  doubt  of  His  Existence  meant  exile  or  death. 

You  will  now  understand  how  the  poet  who  gave  unto  the 
Hebrew  people  their  final  version  of  the  beginning  of  all 
things,  came  to  describe  the  gigantic  labour  of  creation  as  the 
sudden  expression  of  one  single  and  all-mighty  will,  and  as 
the  work  of  their  own  tribal  God,  whom  they  called  Jehovah, 
or  the  Ruler  of  the  High  Heavens. 

And  this  is  how  the  story  was  told  to  the  worshippers  in 
the  temple. 

In  the  beginning,  this  earth  floated  through  space  in  sombre 
silence  and  darkness.  There  was  no  land,  but  the  endless 
waters  of  the  deep  ocean  covered  our  vast  empires.  Then  the 
Spirit  of  Jehovah  came  brooding  over  the  sea,  contemplating 
mighty  things.  And  Jehovah  said,  “Let  there  be  light,”  and 
the  first  rays  of  dawn  appeared  amidst  the  darkness.  “This,” 
J ehovah  said,  “I  shall  call  the  Day.” 

But  soon  the  flickering  light  came  to  an  end  and  all  was 


14f 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


as  it  had  been  before.  “And  this,”  Jehovah  said,  “shall  be 
called  the  Night.”  Then  he  rested  from  his  labours,  and  so 
ended  the  first  of  all  days. 

Then  Jehovah  said:  “Let  there  be  a  Heaven,  which  shall 
spread  its  vast  dome  across  the  waters  below,  that  there  may 
be  a  place  for  the  clouds  and  for  the  winds  which  blow  across 


LET  THERE  BE  LAND 


r‘ 

the  sea.”  This  was  done.  Once  more  there  was  an  evening 
and  a  morning,  and  there  was  an  end  to  the  second  day. 

Then  Jehovah  said,  “Let  there  be  land  amidst  the  water.” 
At  once  the  rugged  mountains  showed  their  dripping  heads 
above  the  surface  of  the  ocean,  and  soon  they  arose  mightily 
towards  the  high  Heavens  and  at  their  feet  the  plains  and 
the  valleys  spread  far  and  wide.  Then  Jehovah  said,  “Let 
the  land  be  fertile  with  plants  which  bear  seed,  and  with  trees 
that  bear  flowers  and  fruit.”  And  the  earth  was  green  with 


CREATION 


15 


a  soft  carpet  of  grass  and  the  trees  and  the  shrubs  enjoyed  the 
soft  caress  of  the  early  dawn.  And  once  more  the  morning  was 
followed  by  eventide,  and  so  the  labour  of  the  third  day  came 
to  an  end. 

Then  Jehovah  said:  “Let  the  Heavens  be  filled  with  stars 
that  the  seasons  and  the  days  and  the  years  may  be  marked. 
And  let  the  day  be  ruled  by  the  sun,  but  the  night  shall  be  a 
time  of  rest,  when  only  the 
silent  moon  shall  show  the  be¬ 
lated  wanderer  across  the  des¬ 
ert  the  true  road  to  shelter.” 

This  too  was  done,  and  so  ended 
the  fourth  day. 

Then  Jehovah  said;  “Let 
the  waters  be  full  of  fishes  and 
the  sky  be  full  of  birds.”  And 
he  made  the  mighty  whale  and 
the  tiny  minnows  and  the  os¬ 
trich  and  the  sparrow,  and  he 
gave  them  the  earth  and  the 
ocean  as  their  dwelling  place  and  told  them  to  increase,  that 
they  and  little  minnows  and  little  whales  and  ostriches  and 
sparrows  might  enjoy  the  blessings  of  life.  And  that  night, 
when  the  birds  tucked  their  tired  heads  underneath  their  wings 
and  when  the  fishes  steered  into  the  darkness  of  the  deep,  there 
was  an  end  to  the  fifth  day. 

Then  Jehovah  said:  “It  is  not  enough.  Let  the  world  also 
be  full  of  creatures  that  creep  and  such  as  walk  on  legs.”  And 
he  made  the  cows  and  the  tigers  and  all  the  beasts  we  know 
unto  this  very  day  and  many  others  that  since  have  disappeared 
from  this  earth.  And  when  this  was  done,  Jehovah  took  some 
of  the  dust  of  the  soil,  and  he  moulded  it  into  an  image,  resem- 


THE  SUN,  THE  MOON  AND 
THE  STARS 


16 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


bling  Himself,  and  he  gave  it  life,  and  he  called  it  man,  and  he 
placed  it  at  the  head  of  all  creation.  So  ended  the  labour  of 
the  sixth  day,  and  Jehovah  was  contented  with  what  he  had 
wrought  and  on  the  seventh  day  he  rested  from  his  work. 


THE  FIRST  SABBATH 


Then  came  the  eighth  day,  and  Man  found  himself  amidst 
his  new  kingdom.  His  name  was  Adam,  and  he  lived  in  a 
garden  filled  with  lovely  flowers,  and  with  peaceful  animals 
who  came  and  brought  their  kittens  and  their  puppies,  that  he 
might  play  with  them  and  forget  his  loneliness.  But  even  so, 
Man  was  not  happy.  For  all  other  creatures  had  been  given 
the  companionship  of  their  own  kind,  but  Man  was  alone. 
Therefore,  Jehovah  took  a  rib  from  Adam’s  body  and  out  of  it 


CREATION 


17 


created  Eve.  Then  Adam  and  Eve  wandered  forth  to  explore 
their  home,  which  was  called  Paradise. 

At  last  they  came  to  a  mighty  tree  and  there  J ehovah  spoke 
to  them  and  said:  “Listen,  for  this  is  very  important.  Of 
the  fruit  of  all  the  trees  in  this  garden  you  may  eat  to  your 
hearts’  content.  But  this  is  the  tree  that  gives  forth  the  knowl¬ 
edge  of  Good  and  Evil.  When  Man  eats  from  the  fruit  of  this 
tree,  he  begins  to  understand  the  righteousness  or  the  wicked¬ 
ness  of  his  own  acts.  That  means  an  end  to  all  peace  of  his 
soul.  Therefore,  you  must  leave  the  fruit  of  this  tree  alone,  or 
accept  the  consequences,  which  are  very  terrible.” 

Adam  and  Eve  listened  and  promised  that  they  would  obey. 
Soon  afterwards,  Adam  fell  asleep,  but  Eve  remained  awake 
and  began  to  wander.  Suddenly  there  was  a  rustling  in  the 
grass,  and  behold!  there  was  a  crafty  old  serpent. 

In  those  days  the  animals  spoke  a  language  which  could 
be  understood  by  man,  and  so  the  serpent  had  no  difficulty  in 
telling  Eve  how  he  had  overheard  the  words  of  Jehovah,  and 
how  foolish  she  would  be  if  she  were  to  take  them  seriously. 
Eve  thought  so  too.  When  the  serpent  handed  her  the  fruit 
of  the  tree,  she  ate  some,  and  when  Adam  woke  up,  she  gave 
him  what  was  left. 

Then  Jehovah  was  very  angry.  At  once  he  drove  both 
Adam  and  Eve  from  Paradise,  and  they  went  forth  into  the 
world  to  make  a  living  as  best  they  could. 

In  due  course  of  time  they  had  two  children.  They  were 
both  boys.  The  name  of  the  elder  was  Cain,  but  the  younger 
was  called  Abel. 

They  made  themselves  useful  around  the  house.  Cain 
worked  in  the  fields  and  Abel  tended  his  father’s  sheep.  Of 
course  they  quarrelled  as  brothers  are  apt  to  quarrel. 

One  day,  they  both  brought  offerings  to  Jehovah.  AbeJ 


18 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


had  killed  a  lamb,  and  Cain  had  placed  some  grain  upon  the 
rude  stone  altar  which  they  had  built  as  a  place  for  worship. 

Children  are  apt  to  be  jealous  of  each  other,  and  they  like 
to  brag  about  their  own  virtues. 

The  wood  on  Abel’s  altar  was  burning  merrily,  but  Cain 


had  trouble  with  his  flint. 

Cain  thought  that  Abel  was  laughing  at  him.  Abel  said 
no,  he  was  just  standing  by  and  looking  on. 

Cain  asked  him  to  go 
away.  Abel  said  no, 
why  should  he?  Then 
Cain  hit  Abel. 

But  he  hit  him  much 
too  hard,  and  Abel  fell 
down  dead. 

Cain  was  terribly 
frightened  and  ran  away. 

But  Jehovah,  who 
knew  what  had  hap¬ 
pened,  found  him  hiding 
in  some  bushes.  He 
asked  him  where  his 
brother  was.  Cain,  in  a 

surly  mood,  would  not  answer.  How  should  he  know?  He 
was  not  a  nurse-maid,  supposed  to  be  looking  after  his  little 
brother,  was  he? 

But  of  course,  this  lie  did  not  do  him  any  good.  Just  as 
Jehovah  had  driven  Adam  and  Eve  from  Paradise  because 
they  had  disobeyed  his  will,  so  he  now  forced  Cain  to  run  away 
from  home,  and  although  he  lived  for  many  years,  his  father 
and  mother  never  saw  him  again. 

As  for  Adam  and  Eve,  their  lives  were  very  unhappy. 


THE  DEATH  OF  ABEL 


CREATION 


19 


Their  younger  son  was  dead  and  their  older  boy  had  run 
away. 

They  had  many  more  children  and  they  died  when  they 
were  very  old  and  bent  down  with  endless  years  of  toil  and 
misfortune. 

***** 

Gradually  the  children  and  the  grandchildren  of  Adam  and 
Eve  began  to  populate  the  earth.  They  went  east  and  they 
went  west  and  they  went  northwards  into  the  mountains  and 
they  lost  themselves  amidst  the  sandy  wastes  of  the  southern 
desert. 

But  the  crime  of  Cain  had  set  its  mark  upon  the  early  race. 
Forever  the  hand  of  man  was  lifted  against  his  neighbour. 
People  murdered  each  other  and  they  stole  each  other’s  sheep. 
It  was  not  safe  for  a  girl  to  leave  her  home,  lest  she  be  kid¬ 
napped  by  the  boys  of  the  neighbouring  villages. 

The  world  was  in  a  sad  state.  A  false  start  had  been  made. 
It  was  necessary  to  begin  all  over  again.  Perhaps  a  new 
generation  would  prove  to  be  more  obedient  to  the  will  of 
Jehovah. 

In  those  days  there  lived  a  man  called  Noah.  He  was  the 
grandson  of  Methuselah  (who  lived  nine  hundred  and  sixty- 
nine  years)  and  he  was  a  descendant  of  Seth,  a  younger  brother 
of  Cain  and  Abel,  who  was  born  after  the  family  tragedy  had 
taken  place. 

Noah  was  a  good  man  who  tried  to  be  at  peace  with  his 
conscience  and  with  his  fellow  men.  If  the  human  race  had 
to  begin  once  more,  Noah  would  make  a  very  good  ancestor. 

Jehovah  therefore  decided  to  kill  all  other  people,  but  to 
spare  Noah.  He  came  to  Noah  and  told  him  to  build  a  ship. 
The  vessel  was  to  be  four  hundred  and  fifty  feet  long  and 
seventy-five  feet  wide  and  it  was  to  have  a  depth  of  forty-three 


20 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


feet.  This  made  it  almost  as  large  as  a  modern  ocean  liner 
and  it  is  difficult  to  see  how  Noah  constructed  such  an  enormous 
craft  entirely  out  of  wood. 


THE  BUILDING  OF  THE  ARK 


But  he  and  his  sons  set  to  work  with  a  will.  The  neighbours 
stood  by  and  laughed.  What  a  funny  idea  to  be  building  a 
ship,  when  there  was  not  a  river  or  a  sea  for  (a  thousand) 
miles  around! 

But  Noah  and  his  faithful  workmen  stuck  to  their  job. 


CREATION 


21 


They  cut  down  the  mighty  cypress  trees  and  laid  the  keel  and 
built  the  sides  and  covered  them  with  pitch,  that  the  hold 
might  be  dry.  When  the  third  deck  had  been  finished,  a  roof 
was  built.  It  was  made  of  heavy  timber,  to  withstand  the 
violence  of  the  rain  that  was  to  pour  down  upon  this  wicked 
earth. 

Then  Noah  and  his  household,  his  three  sons  and  their 
wives,  made  ready  for  the  voyage.  They  went  into  the  fields 
and  into  the  mountains  and  gathered  all  the  animals  they  could 
find  that  they  might  have  beasts  for  food  and  for  sacrifices 
when  they  should  return  to  dry  land. 

A  whole  week  they  hunted.  And  then  the  Ark  (for  so 
the  ship  was  called)  was  full  of  the  noise  of  strange  creatures 
who  did  not  like  their  cramped  quarters  and  who  bit  at  the 
bars  of  their  cages.  The  fish,  of  course,  were  not  taken.  They 
could  look  after  themselves. 

On  the  evening  of  the  seventh  day,  Noah  and  his  family 
went  on  board.  They  pulled  in  the  gang  plank  and  closed 
the  door. 

Late  that  night,  it  began  to  rain.  It  rained  for  forty  nights 
and  for  forty  days.  At  the  end  of  this  time,  the  whole  earth 
was  covered  with  water,  and  Noah  and  his  fellow  travellers  in 
the  Ark  were  the  only  living  ones  to  survive  this  terrible  deluge. 

***** 

Then,  however,  Jehovah  had  mercy.  A  violent  wind  swept 
the  clouds  away.  Once  more  the  rays  of  the  sun  rested  upon 
the  turbulent  waves  as  they  had  done  when  the  world  was 
first  created. 

Carefully  Noah  opened  a  window  and  peered  out.  But 
his  ship  floated  peacefully  in  the  midst  of  an  endless  ocean  and 
no  land  was  in  sight. 


22 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Noah  sent  out  a  raven,  but  the  bird  came  back.  Next  he 
sent  out  a  pigeon.  Pigeons  can  fly  longer  than  almost  any 
other  bird,  but  the  poor  thing  could  not  find  a  single  branch 
upon  which  to  rest  its  feet,  and  it  came  back  to  the  Ark  and 
Noah  took  it  and  put  it  back  into  its  cage. 

He  waited  a  week,  and  once  more  he  set  the  pigeon  free. 
It  was  gone  all  day,  but  in  the  evening,  it  returned  with  a 


IT  BEGAN  TO  RAIN 

freshly  plucked  olive  leaf  in  its  beak.  Apparently,  the  waters 
were  receding. 

Another  week  went  by  before  Noah  released  the  pigeon 
for  the  third  time.  It  did  not  return,  and  this  was  a  good  sign. 
Soon  afterwards,  a  sudden  bump  told  Noah  that  his  vessel  had 


CREATION 


23 


Struck  ground.  The  Ark  had  landed  on  top  of  Mount  Ararat, 
in  the  country  which  is  now  called  Armenia. 

***** 

The  next  day  ^  oah  went  ashore.  At  once  he  took  some 

stones  and  built  an  altar  and 
killed  a  number  of  beasts  and 
birds  and  made  a  sacrifice. 
And  behold,  the  sky  was  bright 
with  the  colours  of  a  mighty 
rainbow.  It  was  a  sign  of 
J ehovah  to  his  faithful  servant. 

It  was  a  promise  of  future 
happiness. 

Then  Noah  and  his  sons, 
Shem,  Ham  and  Japheth,  and 
their  wives,  went  forth  and 
once  more  they  became  farmers 

and  shepherds  and  lived  peacefully  among  their  children  and 
their  flocks. 


But  it  is  very  doubtful 
whether  the  danger  through 
which  they  had  just  passed  had 
taught  them  a  lesson.  For  it 
happened  that  Noah,  who  pos¬ 
sessed  a  vineyard,  had  made  him¬ 
self  a  very  pleasant  wine,  and 
when  he  had  partaken  thereof, 
more  than  was  wise,  he  became 


drunken,  and  behaved  after  the 
fashion  of  such  people. 

Two  of  his  sons  felt  sorry  for  their  old  father,  and  were 
quite  decent  about  it.  But  the  third  one,  called  Ham, 


24 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


thought  it  a  great  joke  and  laughed  loudly,  and  was  not  nice 
at  aU. 

When  Noah  woke  up  from  his  sleep,  he  was  exceedingly 
angry  and  he  drove  Ham  away  from  his  house,  and  the  Jews 


THE  TOWER  OF  BABEL 


believed  that  he  went  to  Africa  and  became  the  first  ancestor 
of  the  Negro  race,  for  which  they  felt  a  great  and  most  unjust 
contempt. 

Thereafter,  we  don’t  hear  much  about  Noah.  One  of  his 
descendants,  called  Nimrod,  achieved  fame  as  a  hunter,  but  the 
Bible  does  not  tell  what  became  of  Shem  and  Japheth. 

Their  sons,  however,  did  something  which  greatly  displeased 


CREATION 


25 


Jehovah.  For  a  while,  so  it  seems,  they  moved  into  the  valley 
of  the  Euphrates,  where  afterwards  the  city  of  Babylon  was 
built.  They  liked  to  live  in  this  fertile  region  and  they  decided 
to  build  a  very  high  tower  which  should  serve  as  a  rallying 
point  to  all  the  tribes  of  their  own  race.  They  baked  bricks 
and  they  laid  the  foundations  for  a  huge  structure. 

But  Jehovah  did  not  want  them  to  remain  for  ever  in  one 
spot.  The  whole  world  had  to  be  populated,  not  just  one 
little  valley. 

While  the  people  were  busy  as  bees  upon  their  Babylonian 
tower,  Jehovah  suddenly  made  them  all  speak  different  dialects. 
They  forgot  their  own  common  tongue  and  a  babble  of  voices 
arose  on  the  scaffolding. 

You  cannot  build  a  house  when  the  workmen  and  the  fore¬ 
men  and  the  architects  suddenly  begin  to  speak  Chinese  and 
Dutch  and  Russian  and  Polynesian.  So  the  people  gave  up 
the  idea  of  a  single  nation,  clustered  around  the  feet  of  a  single 
tower,  and  within  a  short  time  they  had  spread  to  the  uttermost 
corners  of  the  earth. 

This,  in  a  few  words,  is  the  story  of  the  beginning  of  the 
world.  From  now  on,  however,  we  shall  only  relate  the  adven¬ 
tures  of  the  race  men  called  the  Jews. 


THE  PIONEERS 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  EGYPTIAN  PYRAMIDS  WERE  AGES  OLD  WHEN 
THE  JEWS,  UNDER  THE  LEADERSHIP  OF  ABRAHAM, 
VENTURED  FORTH  FROM  THE  OUTSKIRTS  OF  THE 
STONY  DESERT  OF  ARABIA  AND  WENT  WESTWARD 
TO  FIND  NEW  PASTURAGE  FOR  THEIR  FLOCKS 

BRAHAM  was  a  pioneer. 

He  died  many  thousand  years  ago, 
but  the  story  of  his  life  reminds  us  of 
the  brave  men  and  women  who  con¬ 
quered  the  plains  and  the  mountains  of 
our  own  west  during  the  first  half  of  the 
nineteenth  century. 

The  family  of  Abraham  came  from 
the  land  of  Ur  which  was  situated  on  the  western  bank  of  the 
river  Euphrates. 

They  had  all  been  shepherds  ever  since  their  great-grand¬ 
father  Shem  had  left  the  Ark.  They  had  done  well  in  this 
world,  and  Abraham  himself  was  a  rich  farmer  who  owned 
thousands  of  sheep.  He  employed  more  than  three  hundred 

men  and  boys  to  look  after  his  flocks. 

26 


THE  PIONEERS 


27 


They  were  very  loyal  to  their  master  and  would  give  their 
lives  for  him  at  a  moment’s  notice.  They  formed  a  small 
private  army  and  they  were  of  great  use  when  Abraham  had 
to  fight  for  new  pastures  in  the  hostile  land  near  the  Medi¬ 
terranean  shore. 

When  Abraham  was  seventy-five  years  old,  he  heard  the 
voice  of  Jehovah,  who  bade  him  move  away  from  his  father’s 
house  and  find  a  new  home  in  Canaan,  which  was  the  old 
name  for  Palestine. 

Abraham  was  glad  to  go.  The  Chaldeans,  among  whom 
he  then  lived,  were  forever  at  war  with  their  neighbours,  and 
this  wise  old  Jew  was  a  man  of  peace,  and  saw  little  good  in 
all  this  useless  strife. 

He  ordered  his  tents  to  be  taken  down.  His  men  rounded 
up  his  sheep.  The  women  packed  the  sleeping  rugs  and  put 
up  food  for  the  trip  through  the  desert.  And  so  began  the  first 
great  migration  of  the  Jewish  people. 

Abraham  was  married.  The  name  of  his  wife  was  Sarah. 
Unfortunately,  she  had  no  children.  And  so  Abraham  took 
Lot,  his  nephew,  to  be  second-lieutenant  of  the  expedition. 
Then  he  gave  the  sign  for  departure,  and  followed  a  path 
which  led  him  straight  towards  the  setting  sun. 

His  caravan  did  not  enter  the  great  Babylonian  valley,  but 
kept  close  to  the  outskirts  of  the  desert  of  Arabia,  where  the 
soldiers  of  the  ferocious  Assyrian  army  could  not  find  the 
Jews  and  steal  their  sheep  and  perhaps  their  women.  Without 
mishap,  they  all  reached  the  pastures  of  western  Asia. 

There  they  halted  near  the  village  of  Shechem,  where 
Abraham  built  an  altar  to  Jehovah  near  an  oak,  called  Moreh. 
Afterwards,  he  moved  on  towards  Bethel,  where  he  rested 
for  a  while  to  decide  upon  his  future  plans.  For  alas!  the 
land  of  Canaan  was  not  as  rich  as  he  had  expected. 


28 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


When  Abraham  and  Lot  so  suddenly  appeared  with  all 
their  flocks,  the  grass  of  the  hillsides  was  soon  eaten  up.  Then 
the  shepherds  of  Abraham  and  Lot  began  to  fight  among  each 
other  to  see  who  should  get  the  best  pastures,  and  soon  the 
expedition  threatened  to  end  in  a  general  riot. 


This  was  entirely  contrary  to  the  nature  of  Abraham.  He 
called  his  nephew  into  his  tent  and  he  spoke  to  him  and  proposed 
that  they  divide  the  country  and  live  in  peace,  as  good  relatives 
should  always  do. 

Lot,  too,  was  a  sensible  young  man,  and  so  he  and  his 
uncle  came  to  terms  without  any  difficulty. 


ABRAHAM’S  LAST  HOME  IN  THE  DESERT 


:  :v  ,rv^, '  .  ' --;  '^*  ■•  '.■/■'•  ■- 

-V.. -:.-v  -  ■>:.'  >;• '  .  ■;-■  ■  ■  ■;'  ■■■  •  ■:■■ 


.... 

•v  . 


•  \.  .'»/*  7- 


*\ . 


I 


W-' 

;  >,'  ■ 


4' 


.■  ti^ 


'•.t 


^:/-' 


•/■  :-  ,V"-'-  ’•.'  ■  •  * 


■f.- 


:■! 


.'/  ’-ji  '  7.., 


;5 


J 


*.  *  V*  •*  i> 


;■  > 


.••••  ** 


; 


»- 

•i^’ 


■r  ■'-:v-.. 


'  H': 


yV'  .’• 


THE  PIONEERS 


29 


The  nephew  preferred  to  remain  in  the  valley  of  the  river 
Jordan,  and  Abraham  took  the  rest  of  the  country,  which  is 
now  generally  called  Palestine.  He  had  spent  the  greater  part 
of  his  life  under  the  scorching  sun  of  the  desert.  No  wonder 
that  he  hastened  to  find  a  place 
which  should  offer  him  the  cool 
shade  of  mighty  trees. 

He  pitched  his  tent  among 
the  oaks  of  Mamre,  near  the  old 
city  of  Hebron,  and  there  he 
built  another  new  altar  to  show 
his  gratitude  that  Jehovah  had 
safely  guided  him  into  this 
happy  new  home. 

But  he  was  not  allowed  to 
live  in  peace  very  long.  His 
nephew  was  already  in  trouble  with  his  neighbours  and  Abra¬ 
ham  was  forced  to  go  to  war  to  protect  his  family. 

The  most  dangerous  of  the  native  rulers  was  the  mighty 
King  of  Elam.  He  was  so  powerful  that  he  could  hold  his 
own  against  the  rulers  of  Assyria.  Just  then  he  was  trying 
to  levy  tribute  from  the  cities  of  Sodom  and  Gomorrah.  When 
they  refused  to  pay,  the  King  of  Elam  marched  against  them 
with  his  army. 

Unfortunately,  the  fighting  took  place  in  the  valley  which 
Lot  had  occupied.  Soldiers,  when  they  get  excited,  do  not 
always  stop  to  ask  questions.  When  they  rounded  up  the  men 
and  women  from  Sodom  and  Gomorrah,  to  carry  them  away 
as  prisoners,  they  also  took  Lot  and  his  family. 

Abraham  heard  of  this  through  a  neighbour  who  had  man¬ 
aged  to  run  away.  He  called  together  all  his  shepherds.  He 
himself  rode  at  the  head  of  his  troop.  In  the  middle  of  the 


ABRAHAM  AND  LOT  REACH 
RIVER  JORDAN 


30 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


night  he  reached  the  camp  of  the  King  of  Elam.  He  attacked 
the  sleepy  Elamites  at  once  and  before  the  sleepy  guards  knew 
what  had  happened,  Abraham  had  set  Lot  free  and  was  on  his 
way  back  to  the  river  Jordan. 

Of  course,  this  made  him  a  great  man  in  the  eyes  of  the 
neighbouring  tribes. 

The  King  of  Sodom,  who  had  escaped  the  slaughter,  came 
forward  to  meet  him.  He  was  accompanied  by  Melchizedek, 
who  was  King  of  Salem,  or  Jerusalem,  a  very  ancient  city  in 
the  land  of  Canaan  which  had  existed  hundreds  of  years  before 
the  Jews  had  moved  westward. 

Melchizedek  and  Abraham  became  fast  friends,  for  they 
both  recognised  Jehovah  as  the  ruler  of  all  the  world,  but 
Abraham  did  not  like  the  King  of  Sodom,  who  worshipped 
strange  heathenish  gods,  and  when  the  King  of  Sodom  offered 
Abraham  the  greater  part  of  the  booty  which  he  had  recaptured 
from  the  Elamites,  he  refused  to  take  it.  His  hungry  men  had 
eaten  a  few  of  the  sheep,  but  all  the  rest  went  back  to  the 
rightful  owners  in  the  city  of  Sodom. 

Alas!  they  did  not  make  good  use  of  it. 

Both  the  people  of  Sodom  and  those  of  Gomorrah  had  a 
very  bad  reputation  in  the  western  part  of  Asia.  They  were 
lazy  and  indolent  and  they  committed  all  sorts  of  wicked  crimes 
and  never  brought  a  murderer  to  justice  for  his  wickedness. 

Often  they  had  been  warned  that  this  could  not  go  on 
for  ever.  They  merely  laughed  and  continued  to  be  a  general 
nuisance  to  all  the  decent  folks  of  that  part  of  the  world. 

Now  it  happened  one  evening,  when  the  red  sun  had  disap¬ 
peared  beneath  the  dark  blue  mountain  ridges,  that  Abraham 
was  sitting  in  front  of  his  tent.  He  was  contented  with  life, 
for  now  at  last  the  promise  of  Jehovah,  made  in  the  old  days 
in  the  land  of  Ur,  was  about  to  come  true.  Abraham,  who 


THE  PIONEERS 


31 


had  never  had  a  son,  expected  his  wife  Sarah  to  give  him 
a  baby. 

He  was  thinking  of  this  and  of  many  other  things,  when 
three  strangers  came  walking  down  the  road.  They  were 
tired  and  dusty  and  Abraham  bade  them  enter  and  rest  for 
a  while.  Sarah  was  called  and  she  hastily  cooked  some  dinner 
and  afterwards  they  all  sat  and  talked  underneath  the  tree 
where  they  had  eaten. 

When  it  grew  late,  the  strangers  said  that  they  must  be 
on  their  wav.  Abraham  offered  to  show  them  the  nearest 
road.  Then  he  learned  that  they  were  going  to  Sodom  and 
Gomorrah.  Suddenly  he  recognised  that  he  had  been  host  to 
Jehovah  and  two  of  his  angels. 

He  could  well  imagine  what  their  mission  was,  and  forever 
loyal  to  his  own  people,  he  asked  that  mercy  might  be  shown 
to  Lot  and  his  wife  and  children. 

This  Jehovah  promised.  He  went  further  than  that.  He 
promised  that  he  would  spare  the  two  cities  if  he  could  find 
fifty  or  thirty  or  even  ten  decent  people  in  either  of  them. 

He  does  not  seem  to  have  been  very  successful. 

For  late  that  evening.  Lot  received  warning  that  he  must 
at  once  take  his  family  and  bring  them  to  safety,  as  both  Sodom 
and  Gomorrah  were  to  be  burned  to  ashes  before  morning.  He 
was  told  to  make  all  possible  haste  and  that  he  must  not  waste 
his  time  by  looking  backwards  to  see  what  was  happening. 

Lot  obeyed.  He  awakened  his  wife  and  his  children  and 
they  walked  all  night,  as  fast  as  they  could,  that  they  might 
get  to  the  village  of  Zoar  before  morning. 

But  ere  they  reached  a  place  of  safety.  Lot  had  lost  his 
wife. 

She  was  just  a  little  bit  too  curious.  The  sky  was  red  and 
she  knew  that  all  her  neighbours  were  burning  to  death. 


32  THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

She  peeped  just  once. 

But  Jehovah  saw  it.  He  changed  the  woman  into  a  pillar 
of  salt  and  Lot  was  left  a  widower  with  two  young  daughters. 
One  of  these  afterwards  became  the  mother  of  Moab,  after 
whom  the  tribe  of  the  Moabites  was  called,  and  the  name  of  the 
son  of  the  other  was  Ben-Ammi.  He  founded  in  turn  the 
well-known  tribe  of  the  Ammonites. 

The  sad  experience  of  Lot 
had  greatly  depressed  Abra¬ 
ham.  He  too  decided  to  move 
away  from  his  present  where¬ 
abouts  and  farther  away  from 
the  blackened  ruins  of  the 
wicked  cities  and  their  vile 
memory. 

He  left  the  forest  and  the 
plains  of  Mamre,  and  once 
more  went  westward  until  he 
almost  reached  the  shores  of  the 
Mediterranean. 

The  region  along  the  coast  was  inhabited  by  a  race  of  men 
who  had  come  from  the  distant  island  of  Crete.  Their  capital 
city,  Cnossos,  had  been  destroyed  by  an  unknown  enemy  a 
thousand  years  before  the  days  of  Abraham.  Those  who  had 
escaped  had  tried  to  get  a  foothold  in  Egypt,  but  they  had 
been  driven  away  by  the  armies  of  Pharaoh.  They  had  then 
sailed  eastward,  and  as  they  were  much  better  armed  than 
the  Canaanites,  they  had  been  able  to  conquer  a  narrow  strip 
of  land  along  the  shore  of  the  big  sea. 

The  Egyptians  had  called  these  people  Philistines,  and 
they  in  turn  called  their  own  country  Philistia,  or,  as  we  now 
say,  Palestine. 


LOT’S  WIFE  IS  TURNED  INTO 
A  PILLAR  OP  SALT 


THE  PIONEERS 


33 


The  Philistines  were  forever  at  war  with  all  their  neigh¬ 
bours,  and  they  and  the  Jews  never  stopped  quarrelling  until 
the  Romans  came  and  made  an  end  to  their  independence. 
Their  ancestors  had  been  the  most  civilised  people  of  the 
western  world,  when  the  Jews  were  still  rough  shepherds. 
They  had  known  how  to  make  iron  swords  when  the  peasants 
of  Mesopotamia  were  killing  each  other  with  clubs  and  stone 
axes.  This  will  explain  to  you 
why  a  few  Philistines  could  for 
so  many  centuries  hold  their 
own  against  thousands  and 
thousands  of  Canaanites  and 
Jews. 

All  the  same,  Abraham  and 
his  army  of  retainers  marched 
bravely  into  the  land  of  Phi- 
listia,  and  settled  down  near 
Beer- Sheba.  There  they  built 
an  altar  to  Jehovah.  They  dug 
a  deep  well  that  they  might 
have  fresh  water  at  all  hours,  and  they  planted  a  grove  that 
their  children  might  enjoy  the  cool  shade  of  the  trees. 

It  was  really  a  pleasant  home  and  here  the  son  of  Abraham 
and  Sarah  was  born.  His  parents  called  him  Isaac,  which 
means  “laughter,”  for  surely  it  was  happiness  to  have  an  heir 
when  both  the  father  and  the  mother  had  given  up  all  hope. 

At  a  matter  of  fact,  during  the  years  of  waiting,  when  it 
seemed  that  there  would  be  no  descendants,  Abraham  had  taken 
unto  himself  a  second  wife.  This  was  according  to  the  custom 
of  the  time  and  the  country.  Even  to-day,  many  people  in 
Asia  and  Africa,  who  belong  to  the  Mohammedan  religion,  are 
allowed  to  have  two  or  three  wives. 


THE  PHILISTINES  LAND  ON 
THE  COAST  OF  PALESTINE 


34) 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


The  second  wife  of  Abraham  was  not  a  Jewess.  She  was 
an  Egyptian  slave  girl,  named  Hagar.  Sarah,  quite  naturally, 
did  not  like  her  at  all,  and  when  Hagar  had  become  the  mother 
of  a  boy,  who  was  called  Ishmael,  Sarah  began  to  hate  the 
other  woman  and  tried  to  destroy  her. 


ABRAHAM  BUILT  HIMSELF  A  HOME  IN  THE  NEW  COUNTRY 


Of  course,  it  was  natural  for  Ishmael  and  his  half-brother 
to  play  together  on  the  farm.  Most  likely  at  times  they  quar¬ 
relled,  and  I  have  no  doubt  but  that  sometimes  they  engaged 
in  a  merry  fight. 

All  this  Sarah  took  with  very  ill  grace. 

She  was  much  older  and  not  half  as  pretty  as  Hagar.  She 
wanted  to  get  rid  of  this  dangerous  rival  for  her  husband’s 
affection  for  all  time,  and  she  wanted  to  get  rid  of  her  right 
then  and  there. 


THE  PIONEERS 


35 


She  went  to  Abraham  and  insisted  that  he  send  Hagar  and 
Ishmael  away.  Abraham  refused.  After  all,  Ishmael  was  his 
own  son  and  he  loved  the  boy.  It  would  not  be  fair. 

But  Sarah  was  firm,  and  at  last,  Jehovah  Himself  told 
Abraham  that  he  had  better  follow  his  wife’s  wishes.  There 
was  no  use  arguing. 

One  very  sad  morning  the  patient  Abraham,  for  the  sake 
of  peace,  bade  farewell  to  the  faithful  slave-girl  and  to  his 
child.  He  told  Hagar  to  return 
to  her  own  people.  But  it  was 
a  long  and  dangerous  voyage 
from  the  land  of  the  Philistines 
to  Egypt.  Before  a  week  was 
over,  Hagar  and  Ishmael  had 
almost  perished  from  thirst. 

They  lost  their  way  completely 
in  the  wilderness  of  Beer- 
Sheba  and  they  would  have  hagar’S  flight 

died  of  thirst  when  Jehovah  res¬ 
cued  them  at  the  last  moment  and  showed  them  where  to  find 
fresh  water. 

Eventually  Hagar  reached  the  banks  of  the  Nile.  She 
and  Ishmael  found  a  welcome  home  among  their  relations 
and  when  the  boy  grew  up,  he  became  a  soldier.  As  for  his 
father,  he  never  saw  Ishmael  again,  and  soon  afterwards  he 
almost  lost  his  second  son.  That,  however,  came  about  in  a 
very  different  way. 

Abraham,  above  all  things,  had  always  obeyed  the  will 
of  Jehovah.  He  prided  himself  upon  his  righteousness  and 
piety.  Finally,  Jehovah  decided  to  try  him  once  more,  and 
this  time,  the  result  was  almost  deadlv. 

Suddenly  Jehovah  appeared  to  Abraham  and  told  him  to 


36 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


take  Isaac  into  the  mountains  of  Moriah,  to  kill  him,  and  then 
burn  his  body  as  a  sacrifice. 

The  old  pioneer  was  faithful  unto  the  last.  He  ordered 
two  of  his  men  to  get  ready  for  a  short  trip.  He  loaded  wood 
on  the  back  of  his  donkey.  He  took  water  and  provisions  and 
pushed  into  the  desert.  He  had  not  told  his  wife  what  he  was 
going  to  do.  Jehovah  had  spoken.  That  was  enough. 

After  three  days,  Abraham  and  Isaac,  who  had  played 
happily  by  the  roadside,  reached  Mount  Moriah. 

Then  Abraham  told  his  two  servants  to  wait.  He  himself 
took  Isaac  by  the  hand  and  climbed  to  the  top  of  the  hill. 

By  now,  Isaac  was  beginning  to  be  curious.  He  had  often 
seen  his  father  make  an  offering.  This  time,  however,  some¬ 
thing  was  different.  He  recognised  the  stone  altar.  He  saw 
the  wood.  His  father  carried  the  long-bladed  knife  that  was 
used  to  cut  the  throat  of  the  sacrificial  lamb.  But  where  was 
the  lamb?  He  asked  his  father. 

“Jehovah  will  provide  the  lamb  when  the  time  comes,” 
Abraham  answered. 

Then  he  picked  up  his  son  and  laid  him  upon  the  rough 
stone  of  the  altar. 

Then  he  took  his  knife. 

He  pushed  the  head  of  Isaac  back,  that  he  might  more 
easily  cut  the  artery  of  the  neck. 

And  then  a  voice  was  heard. 

Once  more  Jehovah  spoke. 

He  now  knew  that  Abraham  was  the  most  loyal  of  all  his 
followers,  and  he  did  not  insist  that  the  old  man  give  further 
proof  of  his  devotion. 

Isaac  was  lifted  to  his  feet.  A  big  black  ram,  who  had 
been  caught  by  his  horns  in  a  nearby  bush,  was  caught  and 
sacrificed  in  his  stead. 


THE  PIONEERS 


37 


Three  days  later,  father  and  son  were  back  with  Sarah. 
But  Abraham  seems  to  have  taken  a  dislike  to  the  country 
where  he  had  experienced  so  much  unhappiness.  He  left  Beer- 


ABRAHAM  SACRIFICES  ISAAC 


Sheba  where  everything  reminded  him  of  Hagar  and  of  Ish- 
mael  and  of  the  terrible  trip  to  Mount  Moriah.  He  returned 
to  the  old  plains  of  Mamre,  where  he  had  lived  when  he  first 
had  reached  the  west,  and  he  built  himself  a  new  home. 


38 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Sarah  was  too  old  to  stand  the  hardships  of  another  trip. 
She  died,  and  she  was  buried  in  the  cave  of  Machpelah,  which 
Abraham  had  bought  for  four  hundred  shekels  from  a  Hittite 
farmer  by  the  name  of  Ephron. 

Then  Abraham  felt  very  lonely. 

He  had  lived  an  active  life.  He  had  travelled  and  he  had 

worked  and  he  had  fought  hard, 
and  now  he  was  tired  and 
wanted  to  rest. 

But  the  future  of  Isaac 
troubled  him.  The  boy,  of 
course,  would  marry.  But  all 
the  girls  of  the  neighbourhood 
belonged  to  the  tribe  of  the 
Canaanites,  and  Abraham  did 
not  want  a  daughter-in-law 
who  would  teach  his  grand¬ 
children  to  worship  strange  gods,  of  whom  he  did  not  approve. 
He  had  heard  that  his  brother  Nahor,  who  had  remained  in 
the  old  country  when  Abraham  had  gone  west,  had  raised  quite 
a  large  family.  He  liked  the  idea  of  Isaac  marrying  one  of 
his  cousins.  It  would  keep  the  family  together  and  there 
would  not  be  all  this  bother  about  foreign  women. 

And  so  Abraham  called  one  of  his  oldest  servants  (who 
for  many  years  had  been  the  manager  of  his  estate)  and  told 
him  what  to  do.  He  explained  just  what  sort  of  girl  he 
wanted  for  Isaac.  She  must  be  well  versed  in  the  art  of 
making  a  home,  she  must  be  a  help  on  the  farm,  and  above  all 
things,  she  must  be  kindly  and  generous. 

The  servant  said  that  he  understood. 

He  took  a  dozen  camels  and  loaded  them  heavily  with 
gifts.  For  Abraham,  his  master,  had  done  well  in  the  land 


THE  PIONEERS 


39 


of  Canaan,  and  the  people  of  the  old  home  must  be  made  to 
understand  the  importance  of  their  former  feUow  citizen. 

For  many  days  the  servant  travelled  eastward,  following 
the  same  route  which  Abraham  had  taken  almost  eighty  years 
before.  When  he  reached  the  land  of  Ur,  he  went  more 
slowly  and  tried  to  discover  where  the  family  of  Nahor  might 
be  living. 


REBEKAH’S  WELL 


One  evening,  when  the  heat  of  the  day  was  giving  way  to 
the  cool  of  the  desert  night,  he  found  himself  near  the  town 
of  Haran.  The  women  were  just  coming  out  of  the  city  to  fill 
their  pitchers  with  water  and  prepare  for  supper. 

The  messenger  made  his  camels  kneel  down.  He  was  hot 
and  tired  and  asked  one  of  the  girls  to  give  him  a  drink.  She 
said,  “Yes,  certainly,”  and  she  was  most  cheerful  about  it, 
and  when  the  man  had  had  enough,  she  asked  him  to  wait  a 
moment,  that  she  might  give  some  water  to  his  poor  camels, 
and  when  he  asked  her  whether  she  knew  of  a  place  where  he 


40 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


could  spend  the  night,  she  told  him  that  her  father  would  be 
only  too  happy  to  put  him  up  and  feed  his  camels  and  let  him 
rest  until  it  was  time  to  continue  his  voyage.  All  this  seemed 
too  good  to  be  true.  Here  was  the  perfect  image  of  the  woman 
whom  Abraham  had  described  to  his  servant,  and  she  was  alive 
and  young  and  beautiful. 

One  more  question  remained  to  be  asked.  Who  was  she? 

Her  name  was  Rebekah,  and  she  was  the  daughter  of 
Bethuel,  the  son  of  Nahor.  She  had  a  brother  called  Laban, 
and  she  had  heard  of  an  uncle,  called  Abraham,  who  had  moved 
into  the  land  of  Canaan,  years  and  years  before  she  was  born. 

Then  the  messenger  knew  that  he  had  found  the  girl  he 
was  looking  for.  He  went  to  Bethuel  and  explained  his 
errand.  He  told  the  story  of  his  master  and  how  Abraham 
was  one  of  the  richest  and  most  powerful  men  of  the  country 
near  the  Mediterranean  Sea.  And  when  he  had  duly  impressed 
the  people  of  Ur  with  a  display  of  the  rugs  and  the  silver  ear¬ 
rings  and  the  golden  goblets,  which  he  had  brought  from 
Hebron,  he  asked  that  Rebekah  might  accompany  him  to 
become  the  wife  of  young  Isaac. 

Both  the  father  and  the  brother  were  more  than  willing 
to  make  such  an  alliance.  In  those  days,  the  girls  were  rarely 
consulted  in  such  matters.  But  Bethuel  was  a  reasonable  man, 
who  wanted  his  daughter  to  be  happy,  and  he  asked  Rebekah 
whether  she  was  willing  to  go  to  a  foreign  country  and  marry 
her  cousin  whom  she  had  never  seen. 

She  answered,  “I  will  go,”  and  made  ready  to  leave  imme¬ 
diately. 

Her  old  nurse  accompanied  her.  So  did  many  of  her 
maids.  And  they  all  rode  their  camels,  wondering  what  sort 
of  strange  new  country  this  might  be  of  which  the  messenger 
had  painted  such  a  glorious  picture. 


THE  PIONEERS 


'41 


The  first  impression  was  a  very  happy  one. 

It  was  towards  evening. 

The  camels  were  plodding  through  the  dust  of  the  road. 
In  the  distance,  a  man  was  seen  walking  in  the  fields. 

When  he  heard  the  tinkling  bells,  he  stopped. 

He  recognised  his  own  animals.  He  rushed  forward  and 
beheld  the  veiled  face  of  the  woman  who  was  to  be  his  wife. 

With  a  few  words  the  servant  told  the  young  master  all 
he  had  done  and  how  Rebekah  was  as  good  as  she  was  beautiful. 

Then  Isaac  considered  himself  a  lucky  man  (as  indeed  he 
was)  and  he  married  Rebekah  and  a  short  time  later  Abraham 
died  and  was  buried  by  the  side  of  his  wife  Sarah  in  the  cave 
of  Machpelah.  And  Isaac  and  Rebekah  inherited  all  the  fields 
and  the  flocks  and  everything  that  had  belonged  to  Abraham 
and  they  were  young  and  happy,  and  when  evening  came,  they 
used  to  sit  outside  their  tents  and  play  with  their  boys  who 
were  twins;  and  the  name  of  the  elder  was  Esau,  which  meant 
the  “hairy  one,”  and  the  name  of  the  younger  was  Jacob,  and 
they  were  to  have  many  strange  adventures,  as  we  shall  now 
tell  vou. 

For  Esau  and  Jacob  were  as  little  alike  as  any  two  brothers 
have  ever  been. 

Esau  was  a  rough  and  honest  young  fellow,  as  brown  as 
a  bear.  He  had  strong,  hairy  arms,  and  was  as  swift  as  a 
horse.  He  spent  all  his  time  out  in  the  open,  hunting  and 
trapping,  and  living  with  the  beasts  and  the  birds  of  the  fields. 

Jacob,  on  the  other  hand,  rarely  strayed  far  away  from 
home.  He  was  his  mother’s  darling,  and  Rebekah  was  very 
foolish  in  the  way  she  spoiled  him. 

Big,  noisy  Esau,  who  always  smelled  of  camels  and  goats, 
and  who  was  for  ever  bringing  puppies  home  from  the  stable 
into  the  house,  did  not  please  her  at  all.  She  thought  him  a 


I 


42 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


dull  fellow,  only  interested  in  commonplace  things.  But  J acob, 
with  his  mild  ways  and  his  pleasant  smile,  impressed  his  mother 
as  a  very  bright  boy.  She  was  sorry  that  he  had  not  been 
born  ahead  of  Esau.  Then  he  would  have  been  his  father’s 
heir,  and  now  all  of  Isaac’s  riches  were  to  go  to  a  country 
bumpkin,  who  hated  fine  rugs  and  fine  furniture,  and  who  was 
no  better  than  one  of  the  sheepmen  of  the  ranch,  and  hated  the 
bother  of  being  rich  and  belonging  to  a  famous  family. 

But  facts  were  facts,  even  in  those  days,  and  Jacob  had  to 
content  himself  with  the  humble  role  of  a  younger  son,  while 
big,  indifferent  Esau  was  known  far  and  wide  as  one  of  the 
most  important  men  of  the  country. 

The  story  of  the  plot  between  Rebekah  and  her  son  Jacob, 
and  how  mother  and  son  finally  tried  to  cheat  the  elder  brother 
out  of  his  inheritance,  all  this  does  not  make  pleasant  reading. 
As  it  had  great  influence  (to  bear)  upon  the  rest  of  our  chron¬ 
icle,  it  must  be  told,  although  I  would  gladly  spare  you  the 
details. 

Esau,  as  we  have  just  said,  was  a  hunter  and  a  farmer  and 
a  shepherd,  who  spent  most  of  his  time  out  in  the  open.  He 
was  easy-going,  as  such  people  are  apt  to  be.  Life  to  him  was 
a  simple  affair  of  sunshine  and  wind  and  flocks  of  sheep — things 
that  more  or  less  took  care  of  themselves.  He  was  not  inter¬ 
ested  in  learned  discussions.  When  he  was  hungry,  he  ate — 
when  he  was  thirsty,  he  drank — when  he  was  sleepy,  he  went 
to  bed. 

Why  worry  about  anything  else? 

Jacob,  on  the  other  hand,  sat  for  ever  at  home  and  brooded. 
He  was  greedy.  He  wanted  things.  How  could  he  get  hold 
of  what  really  belonged  to  his  elder  brother? 

One  day  his  chance  came. 

Esau  came  home  from  a  hunting  trip.  He  was  hungry 


THE  PIONEERS 


43 


as  a  wolf.  Jacob  was  fussing  around  in  the  kitchen,  making 
himself  a  fine  stew  of  lentils. 

“Let  me  have  some,  and  let  me  have  it  right  now,”  Esau 
begged. 

Jacob  pretended  not  to  hear  him. 

“I  am  starving,”  Esau  said;  “give  me  a  plate  of  your 
lentils.” 

“What  will  you  give  me  in  return?”  his  brother  asked. 

“Anything,”  Esau  answered,  for  just  then  he  wanted  to 
eat,  and  he  found  it  very  difiicult  to  think  of  two  things  at 
the  same  time. 

“Will  you  give  me  all  your  rights  as  the  eldest  son?” 

“Certainly.  What  good  are  they  to  me  when  I  must  sit 
here  and  die  of  starvation?  Let  me  have  a  plate  of  your  stew, 
and  keep  all  the  old  rights.” 

“You  swear  to  it?” 

“I  will  swear  to  anything!  Give  me  some  of  those  lentils.” 

Unfortunately,  the  Jews  of  those  early  days  were  very 
formal.  Other  people  might  have  thought  that  such  talk 
between  young  men  amounted  to  no  more  than  a  jest — a 
hungry  fellow  who  promises  everything  he  has  for  a  square 
meal. 

A  promise,  however,  in  Jacob’s  eyes,  was  a  promise. 

He  told  his  mother  of  what  had  happened.  Esau  had 
voluntarily,  and  in  consideration  of  a  bowl  of  stew,  surrendered 
his  birthright.  Now  they  must  discover  some  way  in  which 
they  could  obtain  Isaac’s  official  consent,  and  then  the  contract 
would  be  formal. 

The  occasion  offered  itself  very  soon. 

Isaac  was  suffering  from  a  complaint  which  is  quite  common 
among  the  people  of  the  desert.  He  was  losing  his  eyesight. 
Besides,  he  had  just  passed  through  a  very  difficult  period. 


44 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


There  had  been  a  prolonged  drought  in  the  plains  of  Mamre, 
and  Isaac  had  been  obliged  to  move  his  flocks  further  westward 
into  the  heart  of  the  land  of  the  Philistines. 

Of  course,  the  Philistines  had  tried  to  keep  him  out.  They 
had  flUed  up  the  wells  which  Abraham,  a  generation  before, 

had  dug  in  the  wilderness  of 
Beer- Sheba.  The  journey  had 
been  weary  and  the  hardships 
had  aged  Isaac,  who  longed  for 
the  familiar  sight  of  the  old 
homestead. 

Now  at  last  he  was  back  in 
the  land  of  Hebron.  He  felt 
that  he  did  not  have  much 
longer  to  live  and  wished  to 
order  his  affairs  that  he  might 
die  in  peace.  And  so  he  sent 
for  Esau,  his  eldest  son,  and 
asked  him  to  go  out  into  the  woods  and  shoot  a  deer  and  make 
him  a  roast,  such  as  he  loved  to  eat.  Then  he  would  bless  him 
and  would  bestow  his  goods  upon  him  as  was  according  to  the 
law. 

Esau  said  “Yes,”  he  would  do  this.  He  fetched  his  trusted 
bow  and  arrows  and  left  the  house.  But  Bebekah  had  over¬ 
heard  the  conversation  and  she  now  hastened  to  tell  Jacob. 

“Quick!”  she  whispered,  “the  time  has  come.  Your  father 
is  feeling  very  badly  to-day.  He  fears  that  he  is  going  to  die 
and  he  wants  to  bless  Esau  before  he  goes  to  bed  to-night.  But 
I  want  you  to  disguise  yourself  and  make  the  old  man  believe 
that  you  are  Esau.  Then  he  will  give  you  everything  he  has, 
and  that  is  what  we  both  want.” 

Jacob  did  not  like  the  idea.  The  plan  seemed  too  risky. 


THE  PIONEERS 


43 


How  could  he,  with  his  smooth  skin  and  his  high-pitched  voice, 
pretend  to  be  the  hairy  Esau?  Rebekah,  however,  had  thought 
it  all  out. 

*‘It  is  simple,”  she  told  him.  “I  will  show  you.” 

She  hastily  killed  two  young  goats  and  she  roasted  the  meat 
as  Esau  used  to  do.  Then  she  took  the  skins  of  the  dead 
animals  and  tied  them  around  the  hands  and  arms  of  Jacob. 
She  put  an  old,  sweaty  coat,  which  belonged  to  Esau,  across 
Jacob’s  shoulders,  and  she  bade  him  speak  in  a  gruff  tone,  and 
behave  just  as  Esau  did  upon  such  occasions. 

Isaac  was  completely  deceived.  He  heard  the  familiar 
voice.  He  noticed  the  smell  of  the  fields  which  was  for  ever  in 
Esau’s  coat.  He  felt  the  strong,  hairy  arms  of  his  eldest  born. 
And  when  he  had  eaten,  he  made  the  impostor  kneel  down  and 
he  blessed  him  and  made  him  heir  to  all  he  possessed. 

But  as  soon  as  Jacob  had  left  his  father’s  room,  behold! 
Esau  returned.  Then  there  was  a  terrible  scene.  The  blessing 
had  been  given  and  Isaac  could  not  go  back  on  his  word.  He 
told  Esau  of  his  great  love,  but  the  evil  had  been  done.  Jacob 
was  a  thief.  He  had  stolen  everything  that  belonged  to  his 
elder  brother. 

As  for  Esau,  he  went  storming  about  and  vowed  that  he 
would  kill  Jacob  as  soon  as  he  had  a  chance.  This  frightened 
Rebekah,  who  knew  that  her  own  spoiled  darling  was  no  match 
for  this  angry  man,  made  stronger  by  his  righteous  wrath. 

She  told  Jacob  to  flee  and  go  east  to  the  land  where  her 
brother  Laban  lived.  And  he  had  better  stay  there  until 
things  had  quieted  down  a  little  at  home.  Meanwhile,  he  might 
marry  one  of  his  cousins  and  settle  down  among  his  uncle’s 
people. 

Jacob,  who  was  no  hero,  did  what  his  mother  told  him. 

But  his  bad  conscience  went  with  him  and  he  had  to  pass 


46 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


through  several  strange  adventures,  before  he  dared  to  return 
home  and  face  the  brother  whom  he  had  so  cruelly  wronged. 

He  found  the  country  of  his  uncle  without  much  difficulty, 
but  on  the  journey  he  had  a  strange  dream.  He  had  fallen 
asleep  in  the  desert,  near  a  place  called  Bethel.  Suddenly,  so 
he  said  afterwards,  the  sky  opened.  He  had  seen  a  ladder 

which  reached  from  the  earth 
I  to  the  Heavens.  On  the  ladder 

were  many  of  the  angels  of  Je¬ 
hovah.  At  the  top  of  the  ladder 
stood  Jehovah  himself  and  Je¬ 
hovah  had  spoken  and  had 
promised  that  he  would  be  a 
friend  to  the  fugitive  and  would 
help  him  during  his  exile. 

But  whether  this  is  reaUy 
true,  that  I  do  not  know  and  I 
rather  believe  that  Jacob  after¬ 
wards  told  the  story  to  ease  the 
knowledge  of  his  own  guilt  and  make  people  believe  that  he 
was  not  really  as  bad  as  they  might  think  since  he  had  retained 
the  friendship  of  so  powerful  a  god. 

As  for  the  help  which  was  to  come  to  him  from  Heaven, 
of  that  we  notice  very  little.  For  when  Jacob  reached  the 
land  of  Ur,  he  found  his  uncle  willing  to  give  him  a  home,  but 
when  he  asked  for  the  hand  of  his  cousin  Rachel,  who  was  young 
and  beautiful,  Laban  first  made  his  nephew  work  for  him  for 
nothing  for  seven  years,  and  then  gave  him  his  oldest  daughter, 
Leah,  whom  Jacob  did  not  like  and  did  not  want.  But  when 
he  said  so,  his  uncle  told  him  it  was  the  custom  of  the  country 
to  give  the  older  daughter  in  marriage  before  the  younger  left 
home,  and  if  Jacob  wanted  Rachel  too,  he  must  promise  to 


JACOB  FLEES  WHEN  ESAU 
RETURNS  HOME 


THE  PIONEERS 


^7 


work  another  seven  years.  In  that  case,  he  could  have  her  also. 

What  could  Jacob  do?  At  home,  Esau  was  waiting  for 
him  with  a  club.  He  had  no  place  which  he  could  call  his  own. 
Besides,  he  loved  Rachel,  and  he  felt  that  he  must  have  her 
if  he  was  to  be  happy.  He  tended  his  uncle’s  sheep  faithfully 
for  another  seven  years,  and 
then  felt  that  he  had  fulfilled 
his  contract. 

Even  then,  he  was  at  the 
mercy  of  his  mother’s  relatives. 

He  had  no  flocks  of  his  own 
and  could  not  set  up  a  house¬ 
hold  of  his  own.  Once  more, 
he  made  an  agreement  with 
Laban.  He  would  work  for 
seven  more  years.  Then  he 
would  receive  all  the  black 
lambs  and  the  spotted  and  the 
speckled  goats  which  happened  to  be  found  on  Laban’s  lands. 
This  would  give  him  a  fair  start  towards  independence. 

It  was  a  curious  bargain.  Laban  knew  that  black  lambs 
are  quite  as  rare  as  spotted  and  speckled  goats.  He  therefore 
did  not  expect  to  lose  many,  and  to  protect  himself  still  further, 
he  took  all  the  male  and  female  goats  that  were  spotted  and 
striped  and  sent  them  to  another  pasture,  where  they  were 
tended  by  his  own  sons,  who  saw  to  it  that  none  fell  into  the 
hands  of  Jacob. 

It  was  a  game  of  wits  between  uncle  and  nephew,  but  in 
the  end,  the  nephew  proved  to  be  the  sharper  of  the  two. 

Jacob  really  was  a  very  good  shepherd.  He  understood 
his  business  and  had  learned  a  good  many  tricks.  He  knew 
how  to  change  the  food  and  the  water  of  his  flocks,  so  as  to 


48 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


increase  the  number  of  certain  strangely  coloured  goats  and 
sheep. 

Laban,  on  the  other  hand,  who  left  most  of  the  farm  work 
to  his  sons  and  to  his  slaves,  was  not  familiar  with  these  new 
methods  of  husbandry.  Before  he  knew  what  was  happening, 
Jacob  had  gained  possession  of  most  of  his  herds.  Then  he 
grew  very  angry,  but  it  was  too  late.  Jacob  had  gone.  He 
had  taken  all  his  black  lambs  with  him  and  all  his  spotted  and 
speckled  goats  and  his  two  wives  and  his  eleven  children.  For 
good  measure,  he  had  forced  his  way  into  the  deserted  house 
of  Laban,  and  had  stolen  the  household  goods  which  belonged 
to  his  father-in-law. 

It  is  true  that  it  never  came  to  open  warfare  between  Laban 
and  Jacob.  It  would  have  been  a  sort  of  civil  war,  anyway. 
But  Jacob  left  the  land  of  Ur  for  ever,  and  as  he  had  nowhere 
else  to  go,  he  decided  to  take  a  risk  and  return  to  Canaan. 
Perhaps  Esau  would  forgive  him,  and  besides  there  was  the 
inheritance  in  case  of  Isaac’s  death. 

Once  more,  if  we  are  to  believe  the  story  of  Jacob,  his 
journey  through  the  desert  was  accompanied  by  strange 
dreams.  Upon  one  occasion,  so  Jacob  vowed,  he  actually 
wrestled  with  an  angel  of  Jehovah,  who  broke  his  thigh  when 
he  threw  him,  and  who  told  him  that  his  name  henceforth  would 
be  Israel,  and  that  he  would  be  a  mighty  prince  in  the  land 
of  his  birth. 

But  when  he  came  near  Mamre,  he  did  not  feel  so  sure  of 
himself,  and  when  he  heard  that  Esau  was  coming  forward 
with  many  men  and  many  camels,  he  greatly  feared  that  the 
day  of  reckoning  had  come. 

He  did  his  very  best  to  gain  the  good  will  of  his  brother. 
He  offered  to  give  him  everything  he  had.  He  divided  his 
flocks  into  three  parts,  and  sent  one  ahead  every  day,  as  a 


THE  PIONEERS 


49 


present  to  Esau.  But  Esau  was  as  kindly  as  he  was  rough. 
He  did  not  want  anything  that  belonged  to  Jacob.  He  had 
forgiven  him  long  ago  and  when  he  met  Jacob,  he  tenderly 
embraced  him  and  bade  bygones  be  bygones.  Their  father,  so 
he  told  him,  was  still  alive,  although  very  old,  and  he  would 
be  glad  to  see  his  new  grandchildren. 

There  were  eleven  of  these  when  Jacob  reached  Hebron,  but 
before  he  got  back  to  the  family  farm  there  were  twelve. 

For  a  long  time  there  had  been  bitter  hatred  between  Bachel 
and  Leah.  Leah,  the  homely  wife  whom  Jacob  did  not  love, 
had  ten  sons  and  daughters.  But  poor  Rachel  had  only  one, 
who  was  called  Joseph.  And  now  she  died  when  she  gave 
birth  to  her  second  boy,  who  was  called  Benjamin. 

This  was  a  sad  home  coming.  Rachel  was  buried  at  Bethle¬ 
hem,  and  then  Jacob  drove  his  flocks  westward  until  he  reached 
Hebron. 

Isaac  was  still  strong  enough  to  greet  his  long  lost  son. 
Soon  afterwards,  however,  he  died  and  was  buried  with  his 
father  Abraham  and  his  mother  Sarah  in  the  cave  of  Machpelah. 

And  Jacob,  who  now  called  himself  Israel,  inherited  his 
father’s  estate,  and  settled  down  to  enjoy  the  fruits  of  a  career 
that  had  been  based  entirely  upon  fraud  and  upon  theft.  Such 
a  life,  however,  is  rarely  a  success.  Before  very  long,  Jacob 
was  once  more  forced  to  leave  his  old  home.  He  spent  the  last 
years  of  his  life  in  the  distant  land  of  Egypt,  and  far  away 
from  the  graves  of  his  ancestors. 

But  of  this,  I  must  tell  you  in  the  next  chapter. 


FURTHER  WESTWARD 


CHAPTER  IV 

AFTER  MANY  YEARS  OF  WANDERING,  THE  JEWS  FOUND 
A  NEW  HOME  IN  THE  LAND  OF  EGYPT,  WHERE  THEIR 
KINSMAN  JOSEPH  HELD  A  HIGH  POLITICAL  POSITION 

OU  must  remember  that  the  Old  Testa¬ 
ment  is  really  a  collection  of  short  and 
unrelated  histories  which  were  put  to¬ 
gether  into  one  hook  when  the  founders 
of  the  Jewish  nation  had  been  dead  for 
ahnost  a  thousand  years.  Abraham 
and  Isaac  and  Jacob  had  been  the  orig^ 
inal  heroes  of  this  chronicle.  They  had 
dared  to  push  forth  into  the  wilderness  and  they  resembled  our 
own  Pilgrim  Fathers  in  their  courage  and  in  their  perseverance 
and  in  their  loyalty  to  their  ideals. 

But  they  lived  in  an  age  when  the  Jewish  people  had  not 
'  yet  learned  the  use  of  letters.  The  account  of  their  adventures 
was  told  from  father  to  son,  and  each  new  generation  added 
a  few  details  to  the  greater  glory  of  their  ancestors. 

It  is  not  always  easy  to  keep  to  the  main  line  in  this  record 
of  events.  One  thing,  however,  strikes  us  with  great  force. 

50 


FURTHER  WESTWARD 


51 


The  Jews  of  thirty  centuries  ago  were  obliged  to  face  a  problem 
which  is  familiar  to  all  students  of  American  history.  They 
were  shepherds,  and  as  such  they  were  for  ever  in  search  of  new 
grazing  lands.  Abraham  left  his  home  and  travelled  westward 
to  find  pastures  for  his  increasing  flocks.  Often  he  thought  that 
he  had  found  a  home  that  would  support  him.  Then  we  see 
him  building  a  house,  digging  wells,  clearing  the  ground  for  a 
few  small  farms.  But  alas !  after  a  few  years,  there  would  be 
a  period  of  drought.  Abraham  would  break  up  camp  and 
once  more  be  a  wanderer  on  the  face  of  western  Asia. 

During  the  life  of  Isaac,  the  land  of  Canaan  was  regarded 
more  and  more  as  the  definite  dwelling  place  of  the  Jewish 
tribes.  But  this  era  of  peace  and  prosperity  did  not  last  long. 
Jacob  himself  never  remained  for  very  long  in  one  spot.  When 
he  was  quite  an  old  man,  the  prolonged  dry  seasons  had  made 
Palestine  almost  uninhabitable,  and  the  Jews  were  forced  to 
leave  Asia  and  move  over  into  Africa.  This  time,  the  absence 
from  the  land  of  their  choice  was  of  very  long  duration.  But 
they  never  lost  sight  of  the  old  home  and  returned  at  the 
earliest  possible  opportunity. 

And  this  was  the  way  the  story  was  told  when  the  old  men 
gathered  around  the  city  walls  of  the  little  Jewish  towns  and 
spoke  of  the  mighty  deeds  of  their  grandfathers. 

Jacob,  you  will  remember,  had  married  two  sisters.  The 
name  of  the  elder  one  was  Leah,  and  she  had  ten  sons.  The 
name  of  the  younger  one  was  Rachel  and  she  had  only  two 
sons,  Benjamin  and  Joseph. 

Now  it  happened  that  Jacob  was  very  fond  of  Rachel,  but 
did  not  care  much  for  Leah.  Quite  naturally  he  loved  the 
children  of  Rachel  more  tenderly  than  those  of  Leah,  and  it 
seems  that  he  showed  his  preference  quite  openly  when  all  the 
children  were  together  at  the  dinner  table  or  out  in  the  fields. 


52 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


This  was  not  very  wise.  It  is  not  good  for  little  boys  to  know 
that  their  father  likes  them  better  than  their  brothers.  It  is 
apt  to  spoil  them. 

As  Joseph  was  a  particularly  bright  child,  much  cleverer 
than  his  half-brothers,  he  soon  became  a  great  nuisance  around 
the  house.  He  knew  that  he  would  not  be  punished,  whatever 


JOSEPH’S  FIRST  DREAM  OF  THE  SHEAVES 


he  said  or  did,  and  he  made  the  best  of  his  opportunities.  For 
example,  one  morning  at  breakfast,  he  announced  that  he  had 
had  a  wonderful  dream. 

“What  was  it  about?”  the  others  asked. 

“Oh,  nothing  much,”  he  answered.  “I  happened  to  dream 
that  we  were  all  out  in  the  field,  binding  sheaves,  and  my  own 
sheaf  was  standing  right  in  the  middle.  But  your  sheaves  were 
standing  all  around  in  a  large  circle,  bowing  very  low  to  my 
sheaf.  That  was  all.” 


FURTHER  WESTWARD 


53 


The  brothers  may  not  have  been  very  bright,  but  they 
understood  what  Joseph  meant  and  they  did  not  like  him  any 
better  for  it. 

A  few  days  later  J oseph  tried  again,  but  this  time  he  went 
too  far,  for  he  even  annoyed  his  father,  and  as  a  rule,  Jacob 


JOSEPH’S  SECOND  DREAM  OF  THE  STARS 


thought  that  everything  Joseph  said  or  did  was  quite  funny  and 
only  another  sign  of  his  cleverness. 

‘T  have  had  another  dream,”  Joseph  said. 

“What  was  it  this  time?”  the  other  members  of  the  family 
asked,  a  trifle  wearied.  “Something  more  about  sheaves?” 

“Oh,  no.  This  time  it  was  about  the  stars.  There  were 
eleven  stars  in  the  Heavens  and  they  and  the  sun  and  the  moon 
all  bowed  to  me.” 

The  eleven  brothers  did  not  feel  flattered.  Neither  did  the 


54 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  Bn3LE 


father,  who  thought  of  Joseph’s  dead  mother.  He  warned 
his  young  son  that  a  little  more  modesty  would  not  be  amiss. 

But  he  could  not  help  spoiling  the  boy,  for  soon  afterwards 
he  bought  him  a  lovely  coat  of  many  colours,  and  of  course. 


JOSEPH  IS  PROUD  IN  HIS  NEW  COAT 

Joseph  must  put  this  on  and  walk  about  in  it  to  show  the  other 
brothers  what  a  very  superior  sort  of  person  he  really  was. 
Well,  you  can  easily  understand  what  happened  in  the  end. 
At  first,  the  brothers  merely  laughed  at  Joseph.  Then  they 
got  annoyed.  Finally,  they  hated  him,  and  one  day,  when  they 
were  all  out  in  the  fields  near  Shechem,  and  when  the  father 
was  far  away,  they  took  J oseph,  stripped  his  fine  coat  off  his 
back,  and  threw  him,  howling  and  fighting,  into  an  empty  pit. 


FURTHER  WESTWARD 


55 


Then  they  sat  down  to  think.  After  all,  they  could  not  very 
well  kill  their  brother.  That  would  be  going  a  little  too  far. 
Neither  did  they  want  him  around  the  house. 

But  Judah  had  a  bright  idea. 

[The  Jews  lived  near  the  high-road  which  led  from  the  valley 


THE  BRETHREN  THREW  JOSEPH  INTO  A  DEEP  DARK  PIT 

of  the  Nile  to  the  valley  of  Mesopotamia.  Caravans  were 
passing  through  their  country  all  the  time. 

“Let  us  sell  Joseph,”  Judah  suggested,  “and  then  we  take 
his  coat  and  tear  it  up  and  smear  some  blood  over  it  and  we 
tell  our  father  that  a  lion  or  a  tiger  came  and  ate  Joseph  up, 
and  we  divide  the  money,  and  no  one  is  any  the  wiser.” 

A  short  time  later,  a  caravan  of  Midianites  came  by  on 


56 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


their  way  from  Gilead  to  Egypt,  carrying  spice  and  myrrh 
for  the  embalmers  of  the  Nile. 

The  brothers  told  them  that  they  had  a  yomig  slave  for 
sale.  After  some  bargaining,  they  sold  their  brother  for  twenty 
pieces  of  silver. 

That  is  how  Joseph  happened  to  go  west.  The  brothers, 
however,  returned  home.  They  stuck  to  their  story  very  faith¬ 
fully,  and  all  eleven  of  them  lied  like  one  man. 

For  the  next  twenty  years,  Jacob  mourned  his  youngest 
son,  who  had  been  killed  by  wild  beasts  when  he  was  still  a  boy, 
while  Joseph — quite  unknown  to  his  family — ruled  the  land 
of  Egypt,  after  some  of  the  strangest  adventures  of  which  the 
world  had  ever  kept  a  record. 

Joseph,  as  I  have  told  you  before,  was  very  bright.  Some¬ 
times,  unfortunately,  he  was  a  bit  too  clever  and  then  his  sharp 
tongue  got  him  into  all  sorts  of  trouble. 

The  experience  at  Shechem  taught  him  a  lesson.  He  still 
saw  many  things  which  escaped  the  attention  of  other  people, 
but  he  did  not  always  say  everything  he  knew. 

The  Midianites  had  bought  the  Jewish  slave  as  an  invest¬ 
ment.  As  soon  as  they  could,  they  sold  him  at  a  good  profit 
to  a  certain  Potiphar,  who  was  a  captain  in  the  Egyptian  army. 

And  so  Joseph  became  Potiphar’s  house  slave,  and  ere 
long,  he  was  the  captain’s  right  hand  man,  kept  his  accounts, 
and  was  overseer  of  all  the  other  workmen  on  the  estate. 

Unfortunately,  Potiphar’s  wife  thought  the  handsome, 
black-haired  boy  much  better  company  than  her  own  dull 
Egyptian  husband.  But  Joseph,  who  knew  that  too  great 
familiarity  between  masters  and  servants  invariably  leads  to 
trouble,  kept  at  a  respectful  distance. 

Well,  the  wife  of  Captain  Potiphar  was  no  better  than 
she  should  have  been.  Her  vanity  had  been  hurt,  and  soon 


FURTHER  WESTWARD 


57 


she  was  telling  her  husband  that  his  new  foreman  was  a  very 
insolent  young  fellow,  and  as  for  his  honesty — well,  she  had 
her  doubts,  and  so  on — and  so  forth. 

In  ancient  Egypt,  a  slave  was  a  slave.  Potiphar  did  not 
bother  to  investigate  these  accusations.  He  sent  for  the  police 
and  Joseph  was  taken  to  prison  and  locked  up,  although  no 
charges  were  preferred  against  him.  But  there  again  his  good 
spirits  and  his  pleasant 
manner  stood  him  in  good 
stead. 

The  keeper  of  the 
prison  was  only  too  happy 
to  let  his  establishment  be 
run  for  him  by  a  faithful 
trusty.  Joseph  was  given 
the  freedom  of  the  jail,  so 
to  speak.  Provided  he 
did  not  leave  the  front 
door,  he  was  at  liberty  to 
do  whatever  he  liked,  and 
out  of  sheer  boredom,  he  spent  a  good  deal  of  his  time  with  his 
fellow  sufferers. 

Among  these,  two  prisoners  interested  him  most  of  all. 
One  had  been  the  chief-steward  of  the  royal  palace  and  the 
other  had  been  Pharaoh’s  baker.  In  some  way  or  other,  both 
had  displeased  His  Majesty,  and  that,  of  course,  was  a  grave 
offence  in  a  day  when  a  king  was  regarded  as  a  god.  The 
Egyptians  especially  had  such  a  tremendous  respect  for  their 
ruler  that  they  never  referred  to  him  by  name.  They  called 
him  Pharaoh,  which  really  meant  the  “Big  House,”  just  as  we 
often  say  “the  White  House”  when  we  really  mean  the  Presi¬ 
dent  of  the  United  States. 


58 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


The  two  men  were  both  servants  of  the  ‘^Big  House,” 
and  they  were  awaiting  their  sentence.  They  had  nothing  to  do 
and  they  whiled  away  the  weary  hours  as  best  they  could.  One 
of  their  favourite  practices  was  to  tell  each  other  their  dreams. 
The  ancient  people  had  great  respect  for  dreams.  A  man  who 
could  explain  them  was  in  their  eyes  a  person  of  importance. 

Joseph  now  made  a  virtue  of  his  old  cleverness.  When  the 
baker  and  the  steward  came  and  told  him  their  visions,  he  read¬ 
ily  agreed  to  explain  them. 

‘‘This  is  what  I  saw,”  the  steward  said.  “I  was  standing 
near  a  vine,  and  suddenly  three  branches  grew  on  that  vine 
and  they  were  full  of  grapes  and  I  plucked  the  grapes  and 
pressed  them  into  Pharaoh’s  drinking  cup  and  placed  the 
cup  in  my  master’s  hand.” 

Joseph  thought  a  moment  and  then  he  answered:  “That 
is  very  simple.  Within  three  days,  you  shall  be  set  free  and 
reinstated  in  your  old  office.” 

Eagerly  the  baker  interrupted  him.  “Listen  to  my  dream, 
for  I  too  saw  many  strange  things.  I  was  going  to  the  palace 
with  three  baskets  filled  with  bread  on  my  head.  But  suddenly 
a  number  of  birds  swooped  down  from  high  Heaven  and  ate 
all  my  bread.  What  does  it  mean?” 

“That,  too,  is  simple,”  Joseph  answered.  “You  will  be 
hanged  inside  of  three  days.” 

And  behold!  on  the  third  day.  Pharaoh  celebrated  his  birth¬ 
day  and  gave  a  great  feast  to  all  his  servants.  He  then  re¬ 
membered  the  baker  and  the  steward,  who  were  still  incar¬ 
cerated.  He  ordered  that  the  baker  be  hanged,  which  was 
done,  and  that  the  steward  be  set  free  and  be  brought  back  to 
the  palace. 

Of  course,  the  steward  was  very  happy.  When  he  left 
his  cell,  he  promised  golden  mountains  to  Joseph,  who  had 


FURTHER  WESTWARD 


59 


foretold  him  his  luck.  He  was  going  to  speak  to  Pharaoh 
and  to  all  the  officials,  so  that  Joseph  should  receive  justice 
and  be  set  free,  and  he  would  always  remember  Joseph’s  good 
service.  But  as  soon  as  he  was  back  in  his  official  uniform, 
standing  behind  the  King’s  chair,  ready  to  fill  the  royal  cup  at 
his  master’s  request,  the  good  butler  forgot  all  about  the  J ewish 
boy  who  had  been  his  companion  for  so  many  months,  and  he 
never  mentioned  him  with  a  single  word. 

It  was  rather  hard  on  Joseph.  He  was  obliged  to  stay  in 
prison  for  two  more  years,  and  he  might  have  died  there  if 
Pharaoh  had  not  had  a  dream  which  greatly  upset  him. 

When  the  King  dreamed,  it  was  a  great  and  solemn  oc¬ 
casion.  All  the  people  talked  about  it  and  every  one  tried  to 
guess  what  the  gods  had  tried  to  reveal  to  the  royal  slumberer. 
It  was  something  like  a  Presidential  message  in  our  own  day. 

The  contents  of  the  royal  nightmare  were  as  follows; 
Pharaoh  had  seen  seven  ears  of  good  corn,  growing  on  one 
stalk.  Suddenly  they  had  been  devoured  by  seven  bad  ears. 
Next,  seven  lean  and  miserable-looking  cows  had  suddenly 
rushed  forth  upon  seven  fat  cows,  who  were  peacefully  grazing 
along  the  banks  of  the  Nile,  and  had  gobbled  them  up,  without 
leaving  a  trace  of  skin  or  bone. 

That  was  all,  but  it  was  enough  to  upset  the  peace  of  mind 
of  His  Majesty.  He  asked  all  the  wise  people  of  the  land 
for  an  explanation,  but  alas!  they  were  at  a  loss  to  tell  him. 
Then  the  butler  remembered  the  Jewish  boy  who  had  been  so 
clever  at  explaining  such  things,  and  he  suggested  to  his 
master  that  Joseph  be  sent  for.  They  found  him  still  in  jail 
and  so  they  had  him  washed  and  shaved  and  ordered  his  hair 
to  be  cut  and  gave  him  a  new  suit  of  clothes,  and  brought  him 
to  the  palace. 

The  boredom  of  prison  life  had  not  dulled  the  quickness 


60  THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

of  Joseph’s  mind.  He  explained  the  dream  with  the  greatest 
ease.  This  was  his  verdict, 

“There  will  be  seven  years  of  plentiful  harvests.  These 
were  represented  by  the  seven  fat  cows  and  the  seven  ears  of 
corn,  growing  on  one  stalk.  They  will  be  followed  by  seven 

years  of  starvation  and 
hunger  and  the  seven  lean 
years  will  exhaust  the 
grain  that  was  grown 
during  the  seven  good 
years.  Let  Your  Maj¬ 
esty  therefore  appoint  a 
wise  man  to  administer 
the  food  supply  of  the 
country,  for  great  will  be 
the' need  when  the  time  of 
famine  comes.” 

Pharaoh  was  greatly 
impressed.  The  young 
man  seemed  to  have 
spoken  with  good  sense. 
It  was  a  time  for  quick 
action. 

Then  and  there  Pharaoh  appointed  the  young  foreigner 
to  be  his  minister  of  agriculture. 

As  time  went  by,  the  powers  of  this  office  were  greatly 
increased.  At  the  end  of  seven  years,  the  son  of  Jacob  was 
the  dictator  of  Egypt  and  ruled  supreme  in  the  land.  He 
proved  a  faithful  servant  to  his  royal  master.  He  built  enor¬ 
mous  granaries  and  filled  them  with  extra  corn  against  the 
coming  of  the  evil  days. 


FURTHER  WESTWARD 


61 


When  at  last,  famine  stalked  through  the  land,  Joseph 
was  fully  prepared. 


The  Egyptian  peasants,  who  had  lived  from  hand  to  mouth 
since  the  beginning  of  time,  had  never  saved  anjrthing.  To  get 
food  for  themselves  and  their  families,  they  were  now  obliged 


62  THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

to  give  Pharaoh  first  their  houses  and  then  their  cattle  and 
finally  they  were  forced  to  surrender  their  land. 

At  the  end  of  the  seven  years,  they  had  lost  everything, 
and  the  King  had  got  all  the  land  from  the  coast  of  the  Mediter¬ 
ranean  to  the  Mountains 
of  the  Moon. 

In  this  way,  the  old 
race  of  Egyptian  free¬ 
men  came  to  an  end.  It 
was  the  beginning  of  a 
slavery  which  lasted  for 
almost  forty  centuries 
and  which  eventually 
caused  more  misery  than 
a  dozen  famines.  On  the 
other  hand,  it  kept  the 
people  alive,  and  it  made 
Egypt  the  commercial 
centre  of  the  civilised 
world.  For  the  famine  was  international  and  Eg5rpt  was  the 
only  country  that  was  prepared. 

Babylonia  and  Assyria  and  the  land  of  Canaan,  they  all 
suffered  equally  from  drought  and  the  grasshoppers  and  other 
insect  pests.  Everywhere  the  people  were  dying  by  the  thou¬ 
sands.  Whole  regions  were  depopulated  and  children  were 
sold  into  slavery  to  keep  the  parents  alive. 

Old  Jacob,  too,  with  his  sons  and  all  their  families,  soon 
felt  the  pangs  of  hunger.  Until  at  last,  in  their  despair,  they 
decided  to  send  some  one  to  Egypt  for  a  small  supply  of  grain. 
Benjamin,  the  brother  of  Joseph,  remained  at  home.  The 
other  ten  sons  took  their  donkeys  and  their  empty  sacks  and 
went  westward  in  search  of  help. 


SLAVERY 


X  -.5*.  ■  ’ 


•  \ 


'.Vf''"  '  ■ 


FURTHER  WESTWARD 


63 


They  crossed  the  desert  of  Sinai  and  at  last  they  reached 
the  banks  of  the  Nile,  There  the  Egyptian  officials  stopped 
them  and  took  them  before  the  viceroy. 

Joseph  immediately  recognised  the  bedraggled  wanderers 
as  his  brothers.  But  he  did  not  betray  his  secret.  He  pre- 


FAMINE  STALKED  THROUGH  THE  LAND  OF  EGYPT 

tended  he  did  not  know  the  Jewish  language.  He  told  his 
interpreter  to  ask  the  newcomers  who  they  were. 

“Peaceful  shepherds  from  the  land  of  Canaan,  in  search 
of  food  for  their  old  father,”  was  the  answer. 

“They  were  quite  sure  they  were  not  spies  sent  out  to  learn 
about  the  defences  of  Egypt,  so  that  a  foreign  invader  might 
force  his  way  into  the  country?” 


64. 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


They  swore  that  they  were  quite  innocent.  They  were  just 
what  they  said.  They  belonged  to  a  family  of  peaceful  shep¬ 
herds,  twelve  brothers  who  lived  with  their  old  father  in  the 
land  of  Canaan. 


JOSEPH’S  BRETHREN  TRAVELLED  TO  EGYPT  TO 

ASK  FOR  GRAIN 


“Where  were  the  other  two?” 

“One,  alas!  was  dead.  The  other  had  remained  at  home 
to  look  after  the  father.” 

Joseph  pretended  that  he  was  not  convinced.  They  had 
better  all  go  back  whence  they  came  and  bring  that  other 
brother  to  prove  their  words.  For  the  Governor  of  Egypt 
had  his  doubts  about  the  truth  of  their  story.  In  some  way  or 
other,  it  did  not  sound  quite  right. 

Then  the  ten  were  in  great  distress.  They  stood  around 
Joseph’s  tent  and  talked  rapidly  in  Hebrew.  Their  old  crime 


FURTHER  WESTWARD 


65 


was  heavy  on  their  minds.  It  was  a  terrible  thing  to  have  sold 
their  brother  Joseph  to  the  foreign  slave-trader.  Now,  ap¬ 
parently,  they  were  about  to  lose  their  second  brother.  What 
would  their  father  Jacob  say  when  he  heard  of  this? 

They  implored  Joseph  to  be  merciful.  But  he  refused. 
He  had  overheard  their  conversation.  He  was  greatly  pleased 
at  their  repentance.  The  last  thirty  years  seemed  to  have 
taught  his  brothers  a  stern  lesson.  But  he  was  not  yet  certain. 
He  must  try  them  once  more  before  he  could  forgive  them 
for  what  they  had  done  unto  him  when  he  was  young. 

And  so  it  was  decided  that  Simeon  should  stay  behind  as  a 
hostage,  while  the  others  went  back  to  get  Benjamin. 

This  proved  no  easy  task.  Jacob  was  heart-broken.  But 
his  family  was  hungry,  his  servants  were  dying,  and  there  was 
no  seed-grain  for  next  year.  And  so  he  was  forced  to  give  in. 
Benjamin  and  the  other  brothers  returned  to  Egypt  and  Jacob 
remained  alone. 

The  last  time,  they  had  been  arrested  as  soon  as  they  had 
crossed  the  frontier.  Now,  however,  all  the  officials  were  most 
polite.  The  brothers  were  straightway  taken  to  the  palace 
of  the  Governor.  There  they  were  given  rooms  and  were 
entertained  in  royal  fashion. 

They  did  not  quite  like  this. 

After  all,  they  were  not  exactly  beggars.  They  were  poor, 
but  they  had  come  prepared  to  pay  for  whatever  they  got. 
They  did  not  want  charity.  But  when  they  offered  their  gold 
in  exchange  for  grain,  they  were  told  that  they  could  have 
all  they  wanted  for  nothing  and  when  they  insisted  upon 
paying  they  found  that  the  money  had  been  returned  to  them 
and  had  been  hidden  in  their  sacks. 

They  were  talking  about  this  strange  occurrence  that  night 
when  they  were  resting  after  the  heat  of  the  day’s  journey. 


66 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Suddenly  there  were  loud  voices  and  out  of  the  darkness 
there  came  a  group  of  Egyptian  soldiers.  They  had  been  sent 
out  to  overtake  the  Jews  and  to  arrest  them. 

The  brothers  asked  what  they  had  done  and  protested  their 
innocence.  The  Egyptian  captain,  however,  had  his  orders. 
The  drinking-cup  of  the  viceroy  had  been  stolen.  No  one  had 
been  near  him  that  day  except  a  few  Jewish  visitors.  All  for¬ 
eigners  must  therefore  be  searched.  The  brothers  submitted  to 
the  inevitable.  One  after  another,  they  opened  their  packs. 
And  behold!  at  the  bottom  of  the  grain  sack  which  was  carried 

by  Benjamin,  and  which 
was  unpacked  last  of  all, 
there  lay  the  drinking  cup 
of  Joseph! 

The  evidence  was 
overwhelming.  As  pris¬ 
oners,  the  Jews  returned 
to  Egypt,  and  were  taken 
into  the  presence  of  the 
viceroy.  In  utter  de¬ 
spair,  they  tried  to  ex¬ 
plain  something  that 
seemed  wholly  inexpli¬ 
cable.  They  swore  that  they  were  not  guilty,  but  Joseph  re¬ 
mained  stern  and  frowning  and  accused  them  of  ingratitude. 
At  last,  they  broke  down.  They  told  J oseph  everything  that 
had  happened  and  how  they  had  once  done  a  very  wicked  thing, 
and  how  they  would  now  give  everything  they  had,  could  they 
but  undo  their  crime.  Until  Joseph  could  not  hold  his  feelings 
in  check  any  longer,  and  he  explained  how  the  cup  had  been 
placed  in  Benjamin’s  sack  at  his  own  command. 

He  ordered  all  Egyptians  to  leave  the  room  and  when  they 


FURTHER  WESTWARD 


67 


were  all  gone,  he  came  down  from  his  throne  and  then  he  em¬ 
braced  Benjamin,  and  to  the  terrified  sons  of  Jacob,  there  stood 
the  mightiest  man  in  all  Egypt  revealed  as  their  own  brother, 
whom  they  had  sought  to  kill,  and  whom  they  had  sold  out  of 
greed  to  the  Midianite  slave-traders. 

Of  course,  so  strange  a  story  appealed  to  all  the  people 
from  the  highest  to  the  lowest.  The  King  gave  a  number  of 
his  own  chariots  to  bring  Jacob  to  Egypt  and  Joseph  took 
some  of  the  newly  acquired  farm  lands  (which  were  in  a 
province  called  Goshen)  and  he  gave  them  to  his  own  family. 

In  this  way,  the  Jews  happened  to  leave  Canaan  and  move 
into  Egypt.  But  in  their  hearts,  they  remained  faithful  to  the 
old  home,  for  when  Jacob  was  dying,  he  asked  that  his  body 
be  taken  to  the  cave  of  Machpelah,  where  his  father  and  his 
mother  and  his  grandparents  lay  buried. 

This  was  done.  Joseph  himself  carried  the  body  back  to 
Canaan.  Then  he  returned  to  Egypt  and  he  lived  for  many 
years  more,  and  his  people  loved  him,  for  he  had  been  as  good 
as  he  had  been  generous. 


A  HOME  IN  EGYPT 


CHAPTER  V 

BUT  THE  JEWS  WERE  ORIGINALLY  A  SIMPLE  PEOPLE  OF 
SHEPHERDS,  AND  CITY  LIFE  IN  A  FOREIGN  LAND  WAS 
NOT  GOOD  FOR  THEM.  RAPIDLY  THEY  BECAME  EGYP- 
TIANISED  AND  INSTEAD  OF  BEING  FREE  AND  INDE¬ 
PENDENT  MEN  AND  WOMEN,  THEY  BECAME  COMMON 
LABOURERS  WHO  WORKED  FOR  THE  KING  OF  EGYPT 
AND  WHO  WERE  TREATED  AS  SLAVES 

NTIL  a  hundred  years  ago,  we  could 
not  read  the  language  of  the  Egyptians. 
As  soon  as  the  key  to  their  hiero¬ 
glyphics  (or  sacred  script)  had  been 
discovered,  a  vast  new  store-house  of 
historical  information  was  opened  up 
to  us.  Now  we  no  longer  depend  upon 
the  accounts  of  the  Old  Testament  for 
our  exclusive  knowledge  of  this  period. 

In  the  fifteenth  century  before  the  birth  of  Christ,  it  seems 
that  Egypt  had  been  conquered  by  a  tribe  of  Arabian  shep¬ 
herds,  who  were  called  the  Hyksos.  They  were  of  the  same 

Semitic  stock  to  which  the  Jews  themselves  belong.  As  soon 

68 


A  HOME  IN  EGYPT 


69 


as  the  Hyksos  were  the  masters  of  the  entire  land,  they  built 
a  new  capital,  many  hundred  miles  away  from  the  old  Egyp¬ 
tian  centre  of  Thebes.  Then  they  settled  down  to  enjoy  them¬ 
selves.  For  almost  three  hundred  years,  they  remained  the 
undisputed  masters  of  the  valley  of  the  Nile. 

Joseph  came  to  Egypt  when  Apepa  was  Pharaoh.  But 
this  king  was  the  last  ruler  of  the  Hyksos  dynasty.  After  many 
unsuccessful  attempts,  the  Egyptians  finally  succeeded  in  get¬ 
ting  rid  of  their  oppressors.  Under  a  king  of  their  own,  called 
Ashmes  (a  native  of  the  former  capital  of  Thebes),  they  drove 
away  the  Hyksos  and  once  more  regained  control  of  their  own 
country.  This,  of  course,  made  the  position  of  the  Jews  a  very 
difficult  one.  They  had  been  the  close  friends  of  the  foreign 
conquerors.  Joseph  had  been  a  conspicuous  figure  in  the  court 
life  of  the  Shepherd  Kings.  He  had  been  a  liigh  state  official 
and  he  had  shown  great  favour  to  his  own  relatives,  at  the 
expense  of  the  natives.  All  this  the  Egyptians  remembered 
long  after  they  had  forgotten  how  Joseph  had  saved  their 
grandfathers  from  starvation.  And  of  course,  they  showed  it 
in  their  conduct  towards  the  Jews,  whom  they  treated  with 
hatred  and  with  contempt. 

As  for  the  descendants  of  Abraham,  the  long  sojourn  in  the 
pleasant  valley  of  the  Nile  had  proved  a  very  mixed  blessing. 

The  Jews  thus  far  had  been  shepherds,  accustomed  to  the 
simple  life  of  the  open  fields.  Now  they  had  come  into  contact 
with  a  people  who  preferred  to  live  in  cities.  They  saw  the 
luxury  and  the  comfort  of  the  palaces  of  Thebes  and  Memphis 
and  Sais.  Soon  they  began  to  despise  the  rude  tents  in  which 
their  ancestors  had  lived  contentedly  for  so  many  centuries. 

They  sold  their  flocks,  they  left  their  farms  in  the  land  of 
Goshen,  and  they  moved  to  the  towns. 

But  the  towns  were  already  overcrowded. 


70 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


The  newcomers  were  not  wanted.  The  Egyptians  regarded 
them  as  people  who  had  come  to  take  the  bread  out  of  their 
own  mouths. 

Soon  there  was  bad  feeling  between  Jews  and  Egyptians. 
Ere  long,  this  showed  itself  in  unpleasant  race  riots. 


THE  JEWS  CAME  TO  LIKE  THE  BUSY  LUXURY  OF  THE  BIG  CITIES 


The  Jews  were  given  the  choice  of  becoming  Egyptians 
or  of  leaving  the  country. 

Of  course,  they  tried  to  compromise,  as  every  one  would 
have  done  under  the  circumstances.  This  was  even  worse.  The 
situation  was  becoming  intolerable  for  both  sides. 

A  famine  had  originally  brought  the  brothers  of  Joseph 
to  Egypt.  Their  descendants  often  talked  of  a  possible  return 
to  the  land  of  Canaan.  But  the  journey  was  long  and  difficult. 


A  HOME  IN  EGYPT 


71 


The  fleshpots  of  Egypt  were  well  filled.  Life  in  the  desert 
would  be  terrible.  Life  in  the  cities,  on  the  other  hand,  was 
very  pleasant. 

The  Jews  found  it  very  difficult  to  make  up  their  minds. 

They  feared  the  uncertainty  of  the  future  more  than  the 
perils  of  the  present.  And  so  they  did  nothing.  For  the 
moment,  they  remained  where  they  were,  in  the  slums  of  the 
Egyptian  cities. 

But  the  moments  grew  into  days  and  the  days  grew  into 
years,  and  the  years  grew  into  centuries,  and  everything  re¬ 
mained  as  before. 

Then  a  great  leader  arose.  He  gathered  the  different 
Jewish  tribes  into  one  nation.  He  took  them  away  from  the 
too  fertile  fields  of  Egypt,  where  life  was  made  for  ease  (but 
where  ease  did  not  make  for  strength  of  character),  and  he 
guided  them  back  to  the  land  of  Canaan,  which  Abraham  and 
Isaac  and  Jacob  had  regarded  as  their  true  home. 


THE  ESCAPE  FROM  SLAVERY 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  SITUATION  GREW  WORSE  AND  WORSE  AND  THERE 
SEEMED  LITTLE  HOPE  THAT  THINGS  WOULD  IM¬ 
PROVE,  WHEN  MOSES,  A  VERY  WISE  LEADER,  DECIDED 
TO  TAKE  HIS  PEOPLE  AWAY  FROM  A  LAND  WHERE 
THEY  WERE  MERELY  “FOREIGNERS”  AND  TO  LEAD 
THEM  TO  A  NEW  HOME  WHERE  THEY  COULD  FOUND 
A  STATE  OF  THEIR  OWN 

N  the  fourteenth  century  before  the 
birth  of  Christ,  when  Rameses  the 
Great  ruled  in  the  valley  of  the  Nile, 
the  relations  between  the  Egyptians 
and  the  Jews  had  reached  a  point 
where  an  open  conflict  could  no  longer 
be  avoided. 

The  welcome  guests  of  a  few  hun¬ 
dred  years  before  were  now  being  degraded  in  every  possible 
way.  The  kings  of  Egypt  had  always  been  fond  of  construct¬ 
ing  large  palaces  and  public  buildings.  Pyramids  were  no 
longer  in  fashion.  The  last  one  had  been  built  two  thousand 
years  before.  But  there  were  roads  and  barracks  and  dykes 

72 


THE  ESCAPE  FROM  SLAVERY 


73 


to  be  made  and  there  was  a  constant  demand  for  workmen  on 
the  royal  estates.  This  labour  was  not  very  well  paid.  The 
Egyptians  therefore  shunned  it  as  much  as  possible.  Rather 
than  exert  themselves,  they  forced  the  J ews  to  do  the  disagree¬ 
able  jobs. 

Even  so,  a  good  many  Jews,  who  were  engaged  in  trade, 
managed  to  maintain  themselves  in  the  cities.  This  was  a  cause 
of  great  envy  to  the  Egyptian  inhabitants  because  they  could 
not  compete  with  the  foreigners.  They  went  to  the  King  and 
asked  that  all  the  Jews  be  exterminated.  This  could  not  very 
well  be  done.  But  Pharaoh,  in  his  love  for  his  subjects,  tried  to 
solve  the  problem  in  a  different  way. 

He  gave  orders  that  all  Jewish  babies  who  happened  to  be 
boys  should  be  killed.  It  was  a  simple  remedy,  but  a  very 
cruel  one. 

Now  it  happened  that  a  man,  called  Amram,  and  his  wife 
(whose  name  was  Jochebed)  had  two  children.  One  was  a 
boy,  by  the  name  of  Aaron,  and  the  other  was  a  girl,  Miriam. 
When  a  third  child  (a  boy)  was  born  to  them,  they  decided  to 
save  it  at  all  cost. 

For  three  months  they  hid  little  Moses  in  their  house  with 
such  care  that  officers  of  the  King  could  not  find  him. 

But  then  the  neighbours  began  to  talk,  and  some  one  had 
heard  the  baby  cry,  and  it  was  no  longer  safe  to  have  the  child 
in  the  house. 

So  Jochebed  took  her  son  and  she  went  to  the  banks  of  the 
Nile  and  she  wove  a  little  basket,  and  she  made  the  sides  water¬ 
tight  with  clay  and  she  placed  the  boy  inside  this  crude  cradle 
and  let  him  go  forth  into  the  wide  world,  all  alone. 

The  improvised  vessel  did  not  go  very  far.  There  was 
little  current.  The  stream  was  shallow,  and  soon  the  tender 
craft  was  caught  by  the  reeds  which  grew  along  the  shores  in 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


74 

such  great  quantities.  By  great  good  luck,  the  daughter  of  the 
King  had  come  to  this  exact  spot  to  take  a  swim.  Her  ladies- 
in-waiting  found  the  strange  bundle  and  fished  it  out  of  the 
water.  A  child  of  four  months  is  usually  very  appealing. 
Pharaoh’s  daughter  decided  to  keep  it.  But  as  she  knew  very 
little  about  babies,  she  asked  that  a  nurse  be  sent  for. 


THE  CHILD  MOSES  WAS  LEFT  TO  THE  MERCIES  OF  THE 

RIVER 


Miriam,  the  sister,  had  watched  this  episode  from  nearby. 
She  now  came  forward,  and  said  that  she  knew  just  the  right 
nurse  for  a  boy  of  that  age.  She  ran  home  and  got  her  mother. 

In  this  way,  one  Jewish  child  at  least  escaped  the  general 
massacre  and  was  educated  in  splendour  in  the  royal  palace, 
under  the  secret  guardianship  of  his  own  mother. 

This  indeed  was  a  strange  fate  for  one  who  had  been  con¬ 
demned  to  die.  While  his  older  brother  had  to  work  in  the 


THE  ESCAPE  FROM  SLAVERY 


75 


brickyard,  and  was  beaten  by  the  foreman  if  he  slackened  in  his 
labours,  Moses  went  about  in  fine  garments  and  lived  like  a 

I 

young  gentleman. 

But  way  down  deep  in  his  heart,  he  felt  himself  a  Jew. 
And  one  day,  when  an  Egyptian  was  beating  up  a  harmless 
old  man  who  belonged  to  the  tribe  of  Abraham,  Moses  inter¬ 
fered.  He  went  further.  He  hit  the  Egyptian  and  he  hit  him 
just  a  trifle  too  hard.  The  Egyptian  fell  down  dead  and  Moses 
ran  the  risk  of  immediate  execution  if  the  deed  should  become 
known. 

It  did  not  remain  a  secret  for  very  long. 

Shortly  afterwards,  when  Moses  went  out  into  the  streets, 
he  found  two  Jews  quarrelling  with  each  other.  He  told  them 
to  stop.  One  of  them  jeered  at  the  peacemaker.  “Who  made 
you  our  master?”  he  asked.  “Do  you  want  to  kill  us  too,  as 
you  killed  that  Egyptian  the  other  day?” 

The  news  travelled  fast.  Orders  were  given  by  Pharaoh 
that  Moses  be  taken  prisoner  and  hanged. 

Moses  was  warned.  He  was  a  wise  young  man.  He  fled. 

Afterwards,  this  proved  an  excellent  thing.  If  Moses  had 
stayed  in  Egypt,  even  if  he  had  escaped  prison,  he  might  have 
become  completely  Egyptianised.  Instead,  the  boy  who  had 
been  the  adopted  son  of  the  King’s  daughter  was  now  a  poor 
exile — a  fugitive  from  justice  in  a  foreign  land. 

He  wandered  through  the  desert  which  surrounds  the  Red 
Sea  until  he  came  to  a  well.  Just  then  the  daughters  of  Jethro, 
a  priest  who  lived  nearby,  were  bringing  their  flocks  to  be 
watered.  At  night,  all  shepherds  tried  to  give  their  animals 
to  drink  at  the  same  time.  As  a  result,  they  often  came  to 
blows.  This  particular  evening,  one  of  the  shepherds  tried  to 
push  himself  ahead  of  the  daughters  of  Jethro.  Moses,  with 


76 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


his  usual  courage,  came  to  the  assistance  of  the  girls.  They, 
in  turn,  invited  him  for  supper  at  their  father’s  house. 

In  this  way,  Moses  met  Jethro  and  became  a  shepherd,  as 
Abraham,  Isaac  and  Jacob  had  been  before  him.  He  married 
Zipporah,  one  of  the  daughters  of  Jethro,  and  he  lived  the 
simple  life  of  all  the  other  desert  folk. 

In  the  solitude  of  the  sandy  waste,  he  recognised  his 
true  mission  in  life.  His  people  had  strayed  away  from  the 
true  principles  which  had  guarded  their  ancestors  through  so 

many  dangers.  They  had  for¬ 
gotten  Jehovah  —  their  God. 
They  were  fast  losing  that  belief 
in  a  great  national  future  which 
had  inspired  their  fathers  and 
grandfathers.  In  short,  they 
had  reached  a  point  where  city 
life  and  luxury  (together  with 
ever  greater  poverty)  were 
threatening  to  destroy  them  as 
an  individual  and  independent 
race  of  men. 

Moses  decided  to  be  the  saviour  of  his  own  people.  He  came 
back  to  a  belief  in  the  almighty  power  of  Jehovah. 

He  declared  himself  the  humble  follower  of  a  great  and 
guiding  will.  And  when  he  felt  thoroughly  convinced  of  his 
own  mission,  when  he  knew  that  he  had  heard  the  voice  of 
Jehovah,  speaking  from  a  burning  bush,  he  returned  to  Egypt 
and  began  the  gigantic  task  of  moving  an  entire  people  from 
one  country  to  another,  through  the  endless  tracts  of  the  desert 
of  Sinai. 

But  there  were  other  difficulties.  King  Rameses  was  dead, 
and  his  successor,  Mineptah,  had  probably  never  heard  of  the 


IN  THE  SOLITUDE  OF  THE 
OLD  DESERT  MOSES  FOUND 
HIS  SOUL 


THE  ESCAPE  FROM  SLA^T:RY 


77 


killing  of  the  Moses  could  therefore  safely  return 

to  as  far  as  the  police  were  concerned.  But  now  the 

Jews  (his  own  people)  were  unwilling  to  believe  in  him. 

Slavery  is  a  bad  thing  for  the  souls  of  men.  It  makes  them 
cowards.  The  Jews  had  a  hard  life  in  Egypt.  But  they  were 
certain  of  three  meals  each  day.  It  was  no  doubt  very  pleasant 
to  talk  about  a  glorious  and  free  existence  in  a  new  country. 
But  that  Promised  Land  lay  many  miles  away  and  just  then  it 
was  in  the  hands  of  hostile  heathen.  There  would  be  fighting 
and  months  of  wandering  through  the  hot  sands  of  Sinai,  and 
at  the  end,  the  success  of  the  expedition  was  very  doubtful. 
Unfortunately,  Moses  was  not  a  good  talker.  He  was  a  man 
of  unbounded  courage  and  endless  patience  and  perseverance. 
But  like  many  another  brave  and  intelligent  leader,  he  got  very 
impatient  when  he  was  trying  to  convince  people  who  were 
unwilling  to  see  the  reasonableness  of  his  arguments. 

And  so  he  wisely  left  the  preliminary  discussions  to  his 
brother  Aaron  and  himself  devoted  his  attention  to  many  de¬ 
tails  that  had  to  be  arranged  before  anything  definite  could  be 
done. 

He  went  boldly  to  Pharaoh  and  asked  that  the  Jewish 
tribes  which  had  come  to  the  country"  voluntarily  during  the 
reign  of  the  great  viceroy,  Joseph,  be  allowed  to  depart  in 
peace. 

His  request  was  curtly  refused.  It  reacted  most  unhappily 
upon  the  poor  workmen  in  the  royal  brick-yards.  Henceforth 
they  were  treated  as  prisoners  who  had  tried  to  escape.  (They 
were  carefullv  watched  and  their  tasks  were  made  harder  than 
before.)  Formerly,  they  had  been  given  the  straw  that  was 
necessary  for  the  making  of  their  bricks.  'Now  they  must  pro¬ 
vide  this  themselves,  and  yet  they  must  turn  out  as  many  bricks 
per  man  per  day  as  they  had  done  before.  This  meant  addi- 


78 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


tional  hours  of  toil.  The  new  regulation  made  the  Jews  very 
angry  with  Moses.  That  is  what  had  come  of  his  meddling. 
He  had  better  return  to  the  desert  whence  he  had  come  and 
leave  his  fellow-countrymen  in  peace,  lest  they  all  perish  before 
the  wrath  of  great  Pharaoh. 

Moses  at  last  began  to  have  a  clear  appreciation  of  the 
extreme  danger  of  his  position. 

He  sent  his  wife  and  his  children,  who  had  accompanied 
him,  back  to  his  father-in-law,  in  the  distant  Midian  country. 
Then  he  began  in  all  seriousness  to  prepare  for  the  days  that 
were  to  follow.  Time  and  again  (but  with  very  little  success) 
did  he  tell  the  Jews  what  they  ought  to  do.  He  tried  to  con¬ 
vince  them  that  it  was  Jehovah  who  was  speaking  to  them. 
They  must  leave  the  land  of  slavery  at  once  if  the  promise  to 
Abraham,  that  Israel  would  be  a  great  nation,  was  ever  to  be 
fulfilled. 

The  Jews  listened.  They  mumbled  to  themselves  and  re¬ 
fused  to  budge.  The  years  of  bondage  had  broken  their  faith. 
They  doubted  the  power  of  their  ancient  God.  They  were 
willing  to  be  slaves. 

Moses  understood  that  neither  side  would  make  a  move 
without  the  use  of  force.  He  alone  was  not  strong  enough  to 
bring  his  own  people  to  reason.  Neither  could  he  hope  to  con¬ 
vince  Pharaoh.  Jehovah  alone  could  do  this,  and  Jehovah  did 
not  desert  his  faithful  servant  in  this  hour  of  need.  He  told 
Moses  to  go  once  more  before  the  King  and  warn  him  of  the 
terrible  things  that  would  happen  if  he  refused  to  heed  the 
warnings  of  the  God  of  the  Jews.  For  the  second  time,  Moses 
and  Aaron  went  to  the  royal  palace,  and  asked  that  their  people 
be  allowed  to  depart  in  peace. 

Again  they  were  refused. 

Then  Aaron  took  his  staff  and  stretched  it  over  the  waters 


THE  ESCAPE  FROM  SLAVERY 


79 


of  the  Nile.  The  waters  turned  red,  and  the  people  were  forced 
to  dig  wells,  that  they  might  not  die  of  thirst. 

Pharaoh  heard  the  cries  of  the  thirsty  people,  but  he  refused 
to  let  the  Jews  go. 

That  was  the  first  plague. 

Then  came  the  next. 

Often  the  banks  of  the  Nile  were  full  of  frogs.  This  time, 
millions  of  the  slimy  beasts  crept  out  of  their  marshy  homes 
and  hopped  all  over  the  land.  They  entered  the  houses  and 


THEN  THE  PLAGUE  VISITED 
THE  PEACEFUL  VILLAGES 
OF  THE  LAND  OF  EGYPT 


tumbled  into  the  newly  dug 
wells,  and  made  everybody  most 
uncomfortable.  Pharaoh  saw 
the  floor  of  his  palace  turned 
into  one  swarming  green  mass  of 
live  frogs.  He  hesitated.  He 
asked  Moses  to  take  the  frogs 
away.  As  soon  as  they  were 
gone,  so  he  promised,  the  Jews 
would  be  allowed  to  leave  Egypt. 

But  when  the  frogs  had  all  died 
at  the  command  of  Moses,  Pharaoh  forgot  all  about  his  given 
word.  The  Jews  were  as  badly  off  as  before. 

Then  came  the  next  plague. 

Clouds  of  large,  disgusting  flies  began  to  buzz  all  over  the 
country.  They  carried  disease  far  and  wide.  The  food  of  the 
Egyptians  was  being  spoiled.  People  were  beginning  to  die. 

Pharaoh  tried  to  compromise.  He  suggested  to  Moses  that 
the  Jews  be  permitted  to  go  to  the  desert  for  a  short  while  to 
sacrifice  to  their  own  God  after  their  own  fashion.  If  they 
promised  to  come  back  when  the  sacrifice  had  come  to  an  end, 
they  could  take  a  short  holiday. 

Moses  made  an  end  to  the  pestilent  visitation  of  the  flies. 


80 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


and  Pharaoh,  glad  to  be  rid  of  this  nightmare,  disregarded 
his  promise  as  soon  as  the  last  fly  had  been  shooed  out  of  his 
dining-room. 

Then  came  the  next  plague. 

All  the  cattle  of  the  Egyptians  fell  sick  with  a  mysterious 
and  deadly  disease.  Soon  there  was  a  dearth  of  fresh  meat. 

Still  Pharaoh  refused. 

Then  came  the  next  plague. 

The  bodies  of  all  men  and  women  were  covered  with  terrible 
sores,  and  no  physician  knew  how  to  cure  them. 

Then  came  the  next  plague. 

A  hail  storm  destroyed  the  harvest  that  stood  in  the  flelds. 

Then  came  the  next  plague. 

Lightning  struck  the  barns  where  the  flax  and  the  seed 
grain  for  the  next  year  had  been  stored. 

Then  came  the  next  plague. 

A  cloudburst  of  grasshoppers  broke  over  the  poor  country. 
Within  a  single  day  all  the  trees  and  shrubs  stood  bare.  Not  a 
leaf  was  left. 

By  now.  Pharaoh  was  thoroughly  frightened.  He  asked 
that  Moses  come  to  see  him.  He  offered  to  let  the  Jews  go, 
provided  they  leave  their  children  behind  as  hostages. 

But  Moses  refused.  His  people,  so  he  announced,  must 
go  with  all  their  sons  and  daughters.  Otherwise,  they  would 
stay. 

Then  came  the  next  plague. 

A  terrible  sandstorm  came  up  from  the  desert.  For  three 
days,  the  rays  of  the  sun  were  obscured  by  the  dust.  The 
land  of  Egypt  lay  in  complete  darkness. 

Pharaoh  asked  Moses  to  hasten  to  the  palace.  ‘T  will  let 
your  people  go,”  he  swore,  “but  they  must  leave  me  their 
flocks.” 


THE  ESCAPE  FROM  SLAVERY 


81 


“My  people  shall  go,  together  with  their  children  and  their 
flocks  and  all  their  household  goods,”  Moses  said,  and  departed. 

Then  came  the  next  plague. 

The  oldest  child  of  every  family  that  dwelled  in  the  valley 
of  the  Nile  died. 

The  Jews  escaped  this  dreadful  fate.  They  had  been 
warned.  On  the  door-sills  of  their  houses  they  had  painted  a 
small  red  mark,  made  with  the  blood  of  a  young  lamb.  When 
the  Angel  of  Death  (at  the  bidding  of  Jehovah)  went  through 
the  unhappy  country,  he  had  stricken  the  sons  and  daughters 
of  the  Egyptians.  But  wherever  he  found  the  sign  of  the 
lamb’s  blood,  he  had  “passed  over”  the  house  that  harboured 
a  descendant  of  Abraham. 

Then  at  last.  Pharaoh  understood  that  he  had  been  defeated 
by  a  power  stronger  than  himself.  No  longer  did  he  refuse 
to  let  the  Jews  depart.  On  the  contrary,  he  begged  Moses  to 
take  his  people  away  as  soon  as  possible  that  there  might  be 
an  end  to  these  terrible  visitations. 

That  evening,  the  tribes  Reuben  and  Levi  and  Judah  and 
Simeon  and  Issachar  and  Zebulun  and  Dan  and  Naphtali  and 
Gad  and  Asher  and  Ephraim  and  Manasseh  ate  their  last 
meal  in  the  land  of  Egypt.  When  night  came,  they  and  their 
flocks  were  well  on  their  way  to  the  old  home  on  the  banks 
of  the  river  Jordan. 

But  Pharaoh,  thoroughly  enraged  by  the  death  of  his  oldest 
son,  once  more  repented  of  his  given  word.  He  and  his  army 
followed  the  fugitives  to  bring  them  back  and  avenge  the 
sudden  death  of  so  many  innocent  children. 

Near  the  coast  of  the  Red  Sea,  they  caught  sight  of  the 
Jewish  caravan.  But  a  cloud  (which  Moses  believed  to  be 
J  ehovah  himself)  hid  the  camp  of  the  Jews  from  the  eyes  of  the 
Egyptian  soldiers. 


82 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Early  in  the  morning,  at  the  command  of  Moses,  the  waters 
of  the  sea  were  divided  and  the  tribes  passed  from  one  shore 
to  the  other  without  losing  a  single  man. 

Then  the  cloud  lifted  and  Pharaoh  saw  his  enemies  ascend- 


A  TERRIBLE  WAVE  DESTROYED  PHARAOH  AND  HIS  ARMIES 


ing  the  steep  banks  of  the  other  shore.  At  the  head  of  his 
army,  he  plunged  into  the  shallow  sea.  But  the  waters  returned 
as  suddenly  as  they  had  departed  before.  With  a  great  splash¬ 
ing  of  waves,  the  King  and  all  his  generals  and  all  his  captains 
and  all  his  common  soldiers  were  drowned. 

No  one  returned  to  tell  the  tale. 

The  Jews  now  entered  the  desert.  They  were  free,  but 
during  forty  long  years,  they  were  to  be  wanderers  in  the 
wilderness. 


WANDERING  IN  THE  WILDERNESS 


CHAPTER  VII 

ONCE  AGAIN  THE  JEWS  SPENT  MANY  YEARS  IN  THE 
DESERT.  OFTEN  THEY  LOST  HOPE  BUT  MOSES  UP¬ 
HELD  THEIR  COURAGE  WITH  HIS  VISION  OF  A  PROM¬ 
ISED  LAND.  MOSES  TAUGHT  THEM  MANY  USEFUL 
THINGS  BUT  JUST  BEFORE  HE  BROUGHT  THEM  TO 
THE  LAND  WHERE  THEY  HOPED  TO  FIND  FREEDOM 
AND  INDEPENDENCE,  HE  DIED 

EOPLE  often  ask  why  the  inhabitants 
of  our  slums  do  not  leave  their  miser¬ 
able  homes  and  move  into  the  open 
spaces  of  the  great  west,  where  a  man 
can  he  his  own  master  and  can  give  his 
children  a  chance  to  grow  up  into 
healthy  and  strong  human  beings. 
The  answer  is  simple  enough. 

These  poor  creatures  have  become  so  accustomed  to  the 
comparative  comforts  of  the  city,  that  they  fear  to  go  forth 
into  an  unknown  land  where  they  must  depend  upon  themselves 
for  their  livelihood. 

In  a  town,  all  sorts  of  things  are  done  for  us  by  the  unseen 


84 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


hands  of  the  government.  Even  the  poorest  citizen  can  get  all 
the  water  he  needs  by  turning  on  a  faucet.  An  immigrant, 
fresh  from  Ellis  Island,  can,  if  he  is  hungry  and  has  a  few 
pennies,  run  to  a  grocery  store  and  buy  himself  a  certain 
amount  of  food,  neatly  prepared  and  done  up  in  convenient 
tin  cans. 

Out  in  the  wilds,  however,  of  an  unsettled  country,  the 
pioneer  must  carry  his  own  water  from  a  nearby  river.  He 
must  kill  his  own  cattle.  He  must  raise  his  own  corn  and 
potatoes. 

Lots  of  people  do  not  know  how  to  do  this.  They  are  afraid 
to  take  a  chance  and  learn. 

And  so  they  live  and  they  die  where  they  were  born,  and 
nothing  short  of  actual  starvation  can  make  them  move. 

Human  traits  rarely  change.  The  Jews  of  three  thousand 
years  ago  were  not  very  different  from  ourselves.  They  had 
been  unhappy  in  Egypt  because  they  had  been  subjected  to 
horrible  slavery.  Now  they  were  free,  but  once  more  they 
complained.  They  hated  the  desert  and  the  sand  and  the  heat ; 
and  soon  they  were  all  blaming  Moses,  who  had  taken  them 
away  from  their  Egyptian  tenements  to  plunge  them  into  a 
new  life  which  frightened  them  more  than  the  whips  of  the 
royal  task-masters. 

The  story  of  the  forty  years  in  the  desert  is  an  endless 
chronicle  of  discontent.  If  it  had  not  been  for  the  unconquer¬ 
able  energy  of  Moses,  the  tribes  would  have  returned  to  bond¬ 
age  before  a  year  was  gone. 

Yet,  during  the  first  moment  of  exaltation,  when  the  Jews 
saw  their  Egyptian  enemies  perish  before  their  eyes,  they  knew 
a  moment  of  triumph  and  happiness. 

“Who  is  like  Thee,  O  Jehovah?”  they  sang.  “Who  is  like 
Thee  among  all  the  gods  of  the  earth  in  glory  and  power?” 


WANDERING  IN  THE  WILDERNESS 


85 


But  when  they  had  spent  a  few  months  among  the  endless 
hills  of  Sinai,  they  no  longer  thought  of  their  God  who  had 
triumphed  gloriously  and  who  was  their  strength  and  their 
staff.  Nay,  they  forgot  all  about  him  and  only  asked  that  they 
be  taken  back  to  the  land  from  which  he  had  just  delivered 
them  after  such  tremendous  effort. 

They  cursed  the  intolerable  wilderness  and  they  openly 
expressed  their  disgust  with  Moses  and  his  foolish  plans.  When 
provisions  began  to  run  low,  they  said  that  they  were  all  surely 
going  to  die  and  they  went  to  their  leader  and  asked:  “Give 
us  to  eat,  or  let  us  return.” 

Moses,  strong  in  his  faith,  told  them  that  Jehovah  would 
provide  for  them  in  their  hour  of  need. 

And  behold!  the  next  morning,  they  found  the  desert  cov¬ 
ered  with  small  white  flakes  which  could  be  beaten  into  a  dough, 
and  which  made  excellent  cakes  of  a  honey-like  sweetness.  The 
Egyptians,  who  knew  this  plant,  had  called  it  “mannu.”  The 
Jews  called  it  “manna”  and  they  believed  that  Jehovah  had 
grown  it  overnight  for  their  own  benefit.  They  gathered  a 
fresh  crop  every  day,  except  on  the  seventh  day,  when  they 
celebrated  the  Sabbath  and  lived  on  the  extra  supply  which 
they  had  laid  in  during  the  previous  twenty-four  hours. 

Such  signs  of  divine  approval  made  the  Jews  more  obedient 
for  a  short  time.  This  mood,  however,  never  lasted  very  long. 
Soon  there  was  a  lack  of  water.  Again  the  heads  of  the  differ¬ 
ent  families  went  to  Moses  and  asked  that  they  might  return 
to  their  old  homes  on  the  bank  of  the  Nile.  Moses  then  beat 
the  rocks  with  his  staff  (as  Jehovah  had  told  him  to  do)  and 
a  rich  stream  of  water  gushed  forth  from  the  hard  granite 
and  they  filled  their  pitchers  and  their  bowls  and  their  skillets 
and  drank  to  their  hearts’  content. 

Then  they  waited  for  a  fresh  cause  for  complaint.  One 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


86 

I 

fierce  tribe  of  Arabs,  called  the  Amalekites,  was  forever  trying 
to  steal  the  cattle  of  the  Jews.  Of  course,  they  could  have 
resisted  these  robberies,  for  they  were  strong  enough  to  defend 
their  own.  But,  as  I  have  said  often  before,  they  had  lived 
for  such  a  long  time  behind  the  sheltering  walls  of  the  cities 
that  they  were  afraid  of  arrows  and  swords.  They  would  rather 


MOSES  STRUCK  ON  ROCK  AND  THE  WATER 

GUSHED  FORTH 


lose  a  few  sheep  and  donkeys  than  go  forth  to  battle.  This 
of  course  encouraged  the  Amalekites  and  they  harassed  the 
Jewish  caravan  until  Moses  decided  that  something  must  be 
done  to  make  an  end  to  this  wholesale  theft.  He  called  Joshua 
to  him,  whom  he  knew  as  a  brave  young  man,  and  whom  he  had 
entrusted  with  some  special  mission  upon  several  previous 
occasions. 

“Drive  away  the  Amalekites,”  Moses  told  him. 


WANDERING  IN  THE  WILDERNESS 


87 


Joshua  obeyed  orders  and  left  the  camp  with  a  few  volun¬ 
teers.  As  soon  as  he  was  gone,  Moses  lifted  up  his  arms 
toward  Heaven  and  as  long  as  his  arms  were  stretched  out 
over  his  troops,  Joshua,  with  the  help  of  Jehovah,  was  success¬ 
ful.  But  when  Moses  grew  tired  and  allowed  his  arms  to  drop, 
then  the  Amalekites  returned  and  fell  upon  the  Jews  and  killed 
manv  of  them. 

When  they  saw  this,  Aaron  and  Hur  supported  the  aching 
arms  of  their  leader,  and  towards  the  evening,  the  Amalekites 
had  been  completely  defeated  and  Jehovah  had  given  the 
victory  to  his  faithful  followers. 

Soon  afterwards  the  caravan  reached  the  land  of  Midian, 
where  the  father-in-law  of  Moses  lived.  The  old  man  was  very 
happy  to  see  his  relatives  once  more.  He  offered  a  sacrifice 
to  express  his  gratitude  to  J ehovah,  whom  he  too  worshipped 
as  the  sole  ruler  of  Heaven  and  earth,  and  he  allowed  his  son 
Hobab  to  join  the  Jews  when  they  marched  northward,  that  he 
might  act  as  their  guide. 

The  wandering  tribes  then  left  the  desert  and  entered  the 
mountainous  region  which  surrounds  the  rock  called  Sinai, 
after  Sin,  the  Asiatic  goddess  of  the  moon.  By  now,  it  had 
become  clear  to  Moses  that  he  would  never  achieve  his  purpose 
imless  he  could  make  his  followers  acknowledge  that  Jehovah 
was  their  only  God.  Abraham  and  Isaac  and  Jacob  had  known 
this  to  be  the  truth.  Their  descendants,  however,  had  lived 
for  such  a  long  time  among  people  who  worshipped  several 
hundred  divinities  that  they  had  lost  the  old  sense  of  a  personal 
relationship  with  one  almighty  ruler  of  both  Heaven  and 
earth. 

Moses  bade  his  men  build  a  fortified  camp  at  the  foot  of 
Sinai.  He  told  them  to  stay  where  they  were  and  wait  for 


88 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


his  return.  He  would  bring  them  a  message  of  the  utmost 
importance. 

Accompanied  only  by  Joshua  (Aaron  remained  behind  as 


THE  JEWS  PITCHED  CAMP  AT  THE  FOOT  OF  THE  MOUNT 

CALLED  SINAI 

commander-in-chief)  Moses  began  to  climb  the  high  rocks  of 
the  ancient  mountain. 

When  he  neared  the  top,  he  asked  Joshua  to  leave  him 
while  he  alone  went  forth  to  hear  the  message  of  Jehovah. 
Forty  days  and  forty  nights  he  was  gone. 

All  that  time,  the  mountain  was  hidden  from  view  by  a 
thick  veil  of  clouds. 

Then  Moses  returned  and  behold!  he  carried  two  large 
tablets  of  stone  and  upon  these  stood  engraved  the  law  of 
Jehovah,  which  has  come  to  be  known  to  us  as  the  Ten  Com¬ 
mandments. 


WANDERING  IN  THE  WILDERNESS  89 

I 

Unfortunately,  the  Jews  had  behaved  very  badly  while 
their  leader  was  gone.  Aaron  was  a  weak  commander.  He 
could  not  enforce  discipline  and  soon  the  camp  had  been  turned 
into  a  veritable  Egyptian  village.  The  women  and  the  girls 


MOSES  FOUND  THE  JEWS  WORSHIPPING  THE  IMAGE 

OF  A  GOLDEN  CALF 


had  stripped  themselves  of  their  golden  ornaments  and  out  of 
these  they  had  made  an  idol  which  reminded  them  of  the  holy 
cows  which  since  time  immemorial  had  been  an  object  of  wor¬ 
ship  to  the  people  of  the  Nile.  They  were  actually  dancing 
around  their  golden  calf  when  Moses  entered  the  camp. 

He  was  in  great  anger.  He  had  heard  the  singing  and 
shouting  from  afar.  Now  he  knew  what  it  meant.  In  his  fury, 
he  threw  the  stone  tablets  upon  the  ground  so  that  they  were 


90 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


broken.  Then  he  pulled  down  the  golden  image  and  destroyed 
it  and  when  this  was  done,  he  called  for  volunteers  to  stamp 
out  this  dangerous  rebellion. 

Only  one  of  the  tribes,  that  of  Levi,  rallied  to  his  support. 
They  were  the  strongest  of  them  all.  They  fell  upon  their 
fellow-travellers  and  they  killed  those  who  refused  to  acknowl¬ 
edge  J ehovah  and  they  showed  no  mercy  to  the  men  who  had 
been  the  ringleaders  of  the  rebellion  against  Moses  and  who 
had  stirred  up  trouble  during  his  absence. 

That  night,  peace  descended  upon  the  camp  of  the  Jewish 
tribe.  Two  thousand  men  lay  slain  and  their  unseeing  eyes 
were  staring  at  the  top  of  Mount  Sinai  where  Jehovah  had 
talked  to  the  first  of  those  great  prophets  who  since  then  have 
tried  to  show  the  human  race  the  folly  of  cowardice  and  un¬ 
righteousness. 

Deeply  disappointed  by  this  occurrence,  Moses  acted  for 
once  with  great  sternness.  He  recognised  that  his  people 
needed  more  than  personal  leadership.  They  must  have  written 
laws  and  they  must  be  forced  to  respect  the  words  of  their 
elders.  Otherwise  the  whole  expedition  would  end  in  anarchy 
and  there  never  would  be  a  united  race  of  Jewish  men  and 
women. 

Once  more  he  went  to  the  top  of  Mount  Sinai.  When  he 
returned,  his  face  showed  clearly  that  he  had  seen  things  which 
thus  far  had  remained  hidden  to  all  other  men.  His  eyes  sent 
forth  beams  of  light.  No  one  could  look  at  him  for  a  long 
time. 

He  carried  two  new  tablets  of  stone  and  upon  these  stood 
engraved  those  selfsame  laws  which  had  been  destroyed  when 
Moses  had  returned  to  find  his  people  worshipping  the  golden 
calf. 


WANDERING  IN  THE  WILDERNESS 


91 

1 

And  these  are  the  commandments  which  Jehovah  had  given 
to  Moses  for  the  conduct  of  the  Jews: 

They  must  recognise  no  gods  except  Jehovah. 

They  must  not  make  themselves  graven  images,  such  as 
had  been  used  in  the  land  of  Egypt. 

They  must  not  take  the  name  of  Jehovah  in  vain. 


AMIDST  THE  THUNDER  OF  MOUNT  SINAI’S  HIGHEST  TOP 
MOSES  RECEIVED  THE  SACRED  COMMANDMENTS 

They  must  work  six  days  but  rest  on  the  seventh  day,  and 
use  it  to  worship  their  God. 

They  must  always  honour  their  fathers  and  their  mothers. 
They  must  not  murder. 

They  must  not  take  another  man’s  wife,  and  women  must 
not  take  another  woman’s  husband. 

They  must  not  steal. 


92 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


They  must  never  give  false  testimony  against  their  neigh¬ 
bours. 

They  must  not  be  greedy  and  wish  for  their  neighbour’s 
house,  nor  his  servants,  nor  his  cattle,  nor  anything  that  be¬ 
longed  to  their  neighbour. 

The  Jews  now  had  their  laws.  But  they  needed  a  place 
where  they  could  come  together  to  worship  Jehovah.  Moses 
therefore  ordered  a  Tabernacle  to  be  built.  It  was  really  a 
church,  made  out  of  wooden  walls,  which  were  covered  with  an 
awning.  Years  later,  when  the  wanderers  once  more  lived  in 
cities,  they  reconstructed  the  original  Tabernacle  with  the  help 
of  bricks  and  marble  and  granite,  and  then  it  became  the  famous 
temple  of  Jerusalem. 

Next  it  was  necessary  to  have  priests  that  the  service  in  the 
Tabernacle  might  be  conducted  according  to  certain  prescribed 
regulations.  Because  the  men  of  the  tribe  of  Levi  had  stood 
by  Moses  when  he  tried  to  suppress  the  worship  of  the  golden 
calf,  they  were  chosen  to  be  priests.  As  ‘‘Levites,”  we  shall 
hear  of  them  all  through  Jewish  history.  As  for  Moses,  he 
made  himself  the  uncrowned  king  of  the  surviving  Jews.  Act¬ 
ing  upon  the  advice  which  his  father-in-law  had  given  him  a 
long  time  before,  he  stated  that  he  alone  was  allowed  to  come 
into  the  presence  of  Jehovah,  whenever  it  was  necessary  that 
some  divine  command  be  imparted  to  the  faithful  ones. 

Furthermore,  he  ordained  that  after  his  death,  this  high 
office  should  go  to  his  brother  Aaron  and  to  his  sons  and  grand¬ 
children  until  the  end  of  time. 

Often  during  the  journey  in  the  desert,  Moses  had  suffered 
because  the  men  and  women  of  the  different  families  hardly 
knew  whom  they  should  recognise  as  their  own  immediate  head. 
Moses  therefore  divided  the  people  into  certain  definite  groups. 
Over  each  one  he  placed  a  trusted  Elder.  Him  he  called  a 


WANDERING  IN  THE  WILDERNESS 


93 


Judge,  that  he  might  hear  all  minor  complaints  and  settle  all 
small  points  of  dispute,  so  that  the  people  might  live  together 
as  good  neighbours. 

Only  when  all  this  had  been  done,  did  he  give  the  sign  to 
break  up  camp.  A  high  pillar  of  clouds,  which  for  more  than 


A  HIGH  PILLAR  OF  CLOUDS  HAD  GUIDED  THE  JEWS 

THROUGH  THE  DESERT 


a  year  had  floated  ahead  of  the  wanderers,  and  which  had  shown 
them  the  path  in  the  desert,  now  settled  down  upon  the  holy 
chest,  or  Ark,  in  which  the  sacred  tablets  of  the  Commandments 
were  carried.  The  Levites  took  up  their  holy  burden,  which 
was  for  ever  to  stand  as  the  centre  of  the  Temple,  and  the  seven 
thousand  men  and  women  and  children  who  remained,  con¬ 
tinued  their  way. 

But  as  they  came  nearer  and  nearer  to  the  old  land  of  their 
fathers,  their  troubles  increased.  The  wife  of  Moses,  Zipporah, 


94  THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

had  died  and  he  had  married  a  woman  of  the  tribe  of  the  Cush¬ 
ites.  In  the  eyes  of  the  other  J ews,  she  was  a  foreigner.  They 
hated  her  and  openly  showed  their  dislike.  In  his  difficulties, 
Moses  was  not  even  supported  by  his  own  brother  and  sister. 
He  had  given  them  high  office  in  the  new  state  which  he  had 


THE  PILLAR  OF  CLOUD  CAME  TO  REST  ON  THE  ARK 


just  founded.  But  they  were  jealous.  They  wanted  more 
honours  for  themselves.  They  said  so  until  Moses,  in  disgust, 
took  Aaron  to  the  top  of  Mount  Hor  and  there  stripped  him 
of  all  his  former  dignities. 

Finally,  when  they  were  almost  within  sight  of  Canaan, 
they  suffered  terribly  from  the  snakes  that  infested  the  coun¬ 
try.  Moses  then  made  a  large  snake  of  copper.  He  put  this 


WANDERING  IN  THE  WILDERNESS 


95 


image  on  a  high  stake  where  all  the  people  could  see  it.  There¬ 
after,  the  deadly  bite  became  quite  harmless. 

But  the  nearer  the  tribes  came  to  the  river  Jordan,  the  more 
aggressive  became  the  attitude  of  their  enemies.  Soon  the 
Jewish  camp  was  full  of  stories  about  terribly  big  men,  who 


THE  SPIES  REPORTED  THAT  THEY  HAD  FOUND 
A  MOST  FERTILE  LAND 

were  called  the  sons  of  Anak  and  who  now  occupied  the  old 
farms  of  Abraham,  whieh  Moses  intended  to  claim  for  the  sole 
benefit  of  his  own  people. 

To  make  an  end  to  these  fairy-tales,  Moses  chose  one  man 
from  each  of  the  twelve  tribes  and  sent  the  twelve  forward  to 
spy  out  the  land  they  were  about  to  conquer.  After  a  short 
while,  Joshua  (who  was  forever  in  the  thick  of  things)  and 
Caleb  (a  young  man  from  the  tribe  of  Judah)  returned  carry- 


96 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


ing  an  enormous  bunch  of  grapes.  These  they  had  found  in  a 
valley  called  Eshcol.  They  reported  that  the  land  was  very  fer¬ 
tile.  It  abounded  in  milk  and  honey.  Of  course,  this  country 
could  not  be  taken  away  from  the  present  occupants  without 
some  fighting.  But  they  were  quite  certain  that  the  J ews  could 
defeat  their  enemies  and  they  advised  an  immediate  advance. 


But  panic  had  already  swept  through  the  tribes.  They  had 
marched  and  marched  and  marched.  They  had  suffered  from 
hunger  and  from  heat  and  from  thirst  and  from  snakes  and 
now  they  were  asked  to  expose  themselves  to  the  deadly  fury 
of  the  Hittites  and  the  Jebusites  and  the  Amorites  and  the 


WANDERING  IN  THE  WILDERNESS  97 

Canaanites  and  the  Amalekites.  This  was  too  much.  Once 
more  they  broke  into  rebellion. 

Many  hot-heads  openly  advocated  a  return  to'  Egypt. 
There  was  much  shouting  and  there  were  many  speeches. 
In  vain  did  Moses  and  Aaron  (who  had  regained  his  courage 
somewhat)  and  brave  Joshua  try  to  persuade  their  followers 
that  no  retreat  was  possible  under  the  circumstances.  The 
people  had  lost  all  reason. 

They  were  tired  of  this  eter¬ 
nal  journeying.  They  wanted 
peace,  although  it  be  the  peace 
of  bondage. 

Then  Jehovah  grew  angry. 

His  patience  had  become  ex¬ 
hausted.  His  voice  was  heard 
from  the  dome  of  the  Taber¬ 
nacle.  The  Jews,  so  he  said, 
had  persistently  disobeyed  his  will.  As  punishment  for  their 
lack  of  faith,  they  were  condemned  to  wander  in  the  desert  for 
forty  years. 

Even  then,  a  few  foolish  souls  tried  to  push  forward  on 
their  own  account.  They  were  all  killed  by  the  Canaanites 
and  by  the  Amalekites. 

But  the  others  accepted  their  fate.  They  turned  their  backs 
upon  the  Promised  Land  and  for  forty  years  they  wandered 
through  the  desert,  and  they  were  shepherds  as  Abraham  and 
Isaac  had  been  before  them. 

Gradually  their  children  forgot  all  about  the  days  which 
their  fathers  had  spent  in  Egypt,  and  driven  by  circumstances, 
they  returned  to  the  simple  ways  of  their  ancestors. 

That  was  what  Moses  had  tried  to  accomplish  from  the  very 


98 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


beginning.  He  had  reason  to  be  content.  His  task  had  been 
fulfilled. 

As  for  this  great  prophet,  who  had  given  the  children  of 
Jacob  certain  laws  which  have  survived  until  this  day,  he  was 
growing  old  and  very,  very  weary.  When  he  felt  that  his 
end  was  near,  he  appointed  Joshua  as  his  successor,  instead  of 
Aaron,  who  was  too  old  and  weak.  Then  he  climbed  to  the 
top  of  Mount  Pisgah,  which  is  on  the  eastern  shore  of  the  Dead 
Sea.  From  there  he  looked  down  upon  the  valley  of  the  river 
Jordan. 

He  died  alone,  and  no  one  knows  where  his  body  lies. 


FINDING  NEW  PASTURES 


CHAPTER  VIII 

J 

THE  WESTERN  PART  OF  ASIA  HAD  BEEN  SETTLED  FOR 
THOUSANDS  OF  YEARS  AND  THE  JEWS  WERE  FORCED 
TO  FIGHT  MANY  WARS  BEFORE  THEY  GOT  HOLD  OF 
A  PIECE  OF  LAND  WHERE  THEY  COULD  FOUND  A 
NATIONAL  STATE  AND  LIVE  UNDER  THE  LAWS  OF 
THEIR  OWN  CHOICE  AND  WORSHIP  THEIR  OWN  GOD 
AS  THEY  HAD  BEEN  TAUGHT  TO  DO  BY  MOSES 

ND  now  began  the  great  war  for  the 
conquest  of  a  new  homeland.  The 
handful  of  frightened  Jewish  house¬ 
holders  who  a  generation  before  had 
fled  from  the  bondage  of  Egypt  were 
now  united  into  one  formidable  army 
of  forty  thousand  men. 

Far  and  wide,  the  red  glow  of  their 
watchfires  could  be  seen  against  the  sky  of  the  night.  No 
wonder  that  the  people  who  lived  on  the  other  side  of  the 
J ordan  became  frightened  and  began  to  put  their  country  into 
a  state  of  defence. 


99 


100 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

But  Joshua,  the  former  lieutenant  of  Moses,  who  had 
succeeded  his  master  as  commander-in-chief,  was  a  careful 
leader.  He  did  not  mean  to  leave  anything  to  chance,  and 
before  he  crossed  the  river  and  entered  the  territory  of  the 
enemy  he  laid  his  plans  with  great  deliberation. 

He  had  established 
his  headquarters  in  the 
village  of  Shittim.  From 
there  he  sent  two  men  to 
Canaan  that  they  might 
report  upon  the  general 
lay  of  the  land. 

The  spies  left  the 
Jewish  camp  and  made 
for  the  city  of  Jericho. 

This  was  the  most  impor¬ 
tant  stronghold  in  that 
part  of  the  country.  It 
had  to  be  taken  before 
any  further  progress 
could  be  made. 

The  two  Jewish  soldiers  slipped  through  the  gates  and 
entered  Jericho.  They  spent  the  entire  day  talking  to  people 
and  studying  the  strength  of  the  walls  and  listening  to  stories 
about  the  conduct  and  the  spirit  of  the  soldiers.  When  night 
came,  they  went  to  the  home  of  a  woman  called  Rahab.  Rahab 
was  not  very  particular  in  the  choice  of  her  friends.  She  gave 
the  strangers  a  room  and  asked  no  questions. 

But  in  one  way  or  another,  the  presence  of  the  two  foreign- 
looking  men  had  become  known  to  the  authorities.  Soon  the 
police  were  on  the  trail  of  the  intruders.  At  once  suspicion 
turned  against  Rahab.  She  did  not  enjoy  a  good  reputation, 


THE  GLOW  OF  THE  JEWISH  WATCH- 
FIRES  WAS  SEEN  FAR  AND  WIDE 


f 


FINDING  NEW  PASTURES  101 

and  whenever  there  was  trouble,  her  house  was  searched  before 
all  others. 

Rahab,  however,  proved  more  reliable  than  any  one  had  a 
reason  to  expect.  When  she  heard  a  knock  on  her  door,  she 
hastily  took  the  Jews  to  the  flat  roof  of  her  home  and  there 
she  hid  them  underneath  a  pile  of  flax.  As  the  roofs  of  all  the 
houses  were  used  for  the  purpose  of  drying  flax,  the  policemen 
noticed  nothing  out  of  the  ordinary.  They  left  and  went  to 
another  part  of  the  town.  But  they  did  not  find  a  single 
suspicious  character  anywhere  and  they  decided  that  they  had 
been  misinformed  (as  happened  quite  often).  They  returned 
to  their  barracks,  and  soon  the  whole  city  was  peacefully  asleep. 

Then  Rahab  returned  to  the  roof.  She  carried  a  rope  made 
of  fresh  hemp.  It  looked  a  bright  red. 

“With  this  rope,”  so  she  told  her  involuntary  prisoners, 
“I  will  let  you  down  to  the  street.  You  can  easily  make  your 
escape,  for  the  walls  are  no  longer  guarded.  Once  outside, 
make  for  the  hills,  and  there  await  an  opportunity  to  cross  the 
river.  But  remember  one  thing.  This  day  I  have  saved  your 
lives.  When  your  people  take  Jericho  (as  they  probably  will) 
I  expect  safety  for  myself  and  for  my  family  and  for  all  my 
friends.  That  is  a  bargain.” 

Of  course,  the  spies  were  willing  to  promise  anything. 

They  told  Rahab  to  fasten  the  same  red  rope  to  the  window¬ 
sill  of  her  house  when  the  troops  of  Joshua  should  enter  the 
city.  That  would  be  a  token  to  the  soldiers  that  this  was  the 
house  of  a  friend,  and  that  the  inhabitants  must  be  spared. 

This  seemed  fair  to  Rahab.  She  fastened  the  rope  to  one 
of  the  beams  of  the  roof  and  the  spies  slipped  down  to  the 
deserted  street.  How  they  managed  to  get  outside  the  city, 
that  I  do  not  know.  But  as  soon  as  they  were  in  the  open, 
they  were  once  more  detected.  They  ran  as  fast  as  they  could 


102 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


and  reached  the  hills.  Three  days  later  they  had  a  chance 
to  swim  across  the  J ordan. 

The  rest  of  their  trip  offered  no  difficulties. 

Soon  they  were  back  among  their  own  people  and  told  their 
general  of  their  experiences. 

When  Joshua  heard  that  the  people  of  Jericho  were  in  a 

state  of  fear,  he  decided  to  make 
his  attack  as  soon  as  he  could 
move  his  men  across  the  river. 

This  proved  unexpectedly 
easy.  For  when  the  priests, 
who  as  usual  carried  the  Ark 
at  the  head  of  the  troops,  had 
reached  the  banks  of  the  Jor¬ 
dan,  the  waters  ceased  to  flow. 
The  priests  and  their  holy  bur¬ 
den  then  took  up  a  position  in 
the  middle  of  the  river-bed  and 
there  they  stood  until  all  the 
soldiers  had  safely  reached  the  other  side.  A  few  minutes  later 
the  waters  of  the  flood  returned  and  everything  was  as  it  had 
been  before.  At  last  the  J ews  were  back  in  the  land  that  had 
been  the  home  of  their  ancestors. 

After  a  short  march,  the  army  came  to  a  halt  near  the  village 
of  Gilgal.  It  was  the  day  of  Passover. 

Much  had  happened  in  those  thirty  years  since  first  they 
had  kept  the  holy  feast  amidst  the  sandy  wastes  of  the  great 
desert  of  Sinai.  There  was  cause  for  gratitude  and  thanks¬ 
giving. 

But  much  remained  to  be  done.  Beyond  those  pleasant 
fields  where  the  soldiers  enjoyed  their  holiday  lay  Jericho.  To 
capture  such  a  town  without  a  prolonged  siege  seemed  well- 
nigh  impossible. 


THE  SPIES  ESCAPE  FROM  THE 
HOUSE  OF  RAHAB 


FINDING  NEW  PASTURES 


103 


J oshua,  the  ever  careful,  knew  that  he  could  not  rely  upon 
his  own  strength.  He  prayed. 

He  asked  J ehovah  to  help  him.  And  Jehovah  sent  an  angel, 
who  told  the  Jewish  general  what  to  do. 

Thereafter,  every  morning  for  six  days  in  succession,  the 
army  of  the  invaders  marched  slowly  and  solemnly  around  the 
walls  of  Jericho. 

At  the  head  of  the  proces¬ 
sion  went  seven  priests.  High 
upon  their  shoulders  they  car¬ 
ried  the  Ark  and  all  the  while 
they  blew  upon  trumpets, 
made  out  of  the  curved  horns  of 
the  ram. 

On  the  seventh  day,  they 
walked  around  the  town  seven 
times. 

The  priests  blew  their  trum¬ 
pets  until  the  veins  of  their 
brows  threatened  to  burst  and  all  the  soldiers  shouted  words 
in  praise  of  their  God. 

At  that  moment,  Jehovah  fulfilled  his  promise. 

The  walls  of  Jericho  crumbled  down  like  snow  melting 
before  the  first  hot  sun  of  spring. 

The  mighty  city  was  at  the  mercy  of  the  Jews. 

They  killed  all  the  inhabitants,  the  men  and  the  women 
and  the  children,  and  the  cows  and  the  sheep  and  the  dogs  and 
everything  that  drew  the  breath  of  life,  with  the  exception  of 
Rahab  and  her  friends.  Then  they  took  possession  of  the  ruins 
and  prepared  for  the  next  campaign,  for  now  it  seemed  that 


Suddenly  they  all  stopped. 


THE  FORD  ACROSS  THE 
JORDAN 


104 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


all  the  land  between  themselves  and  the  Mediterranean  Sea 
was  at  their  mercy. 

But  alas!  all  was  not  well  within  the  camp  of  Joshua.  The 


THE  JEWISH  ARMY  MARCHES  AROUND  THE  WALLS  OF  JERICHO 

expedition  which  had  begun  so  well  was  suddenly  threatened 
with  defeat. 

Just  before  the  attack,  Joshua  had  given  a  few  final  instruc¬ 
tions.  He  positively  forbade  the  soldiers  to  take  or  keep  any 
loot.  Everything  must  be  surrendered  to  the  tabernacle. 


FINDING  NEW  PASTURES 


105 


Most  of  the  men  had  obeyed  these  orders,  but  one  private, 
by  the  name  of  Achan,  who  belonged  to  the  tribe  of  Judah, 
stole  a  few  hundred  pieces  of  silver  and  gold  and  a  few  bits  of 
clothing  and  he  had  hidden  them  underneath  the  floor  of 
his  tent. 

Of  course,  Joshua  could  not  possibly  know  this  and  he 


THE  WALLS  OF  JERICHO  FALL  DOWN 


continued  his  westward  march,  fully  expecting  that  Jehovah 
would  continue  to  give  him  victory.  But  although  the  people 
of  Ai  were  much  frightened  by  the  horrible  things  which  had 
just  happened  to  their  neighbours  of  Jericho,  they  did  not  sur- 


106 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


render.  And  as  soon  as  the  J ews  attacked,  they  made  a  sally, 
and  they  broke  through  the  ranks  of  the  invaders  and  they 
forced  them  to  retreat  in  great  disorder  and  with  a  severe  loss 
of  men. 

Then  it  became  clear  to  Joshua  that  soine  one  had  been 
unfaithful.  He  called  together  all  the  survivors  of  the  rout 
and  told  them  what  he  suspected.  He  asked  the  guilty  man 
to  confess,  that  the  others  might  he  saved.  Achan,  however, 
hoped  to  lie  himself  out  of  his  trouble  and  he  did  not  step 
forward  as  he  should  have  done. 

After  a  while,  when  no  one  seemed  willing  to  take  the  blame 
upon  himself,  Joshua  decided  to  detect  the  thief  by  means  of 
casting  lots.  The  lot  pointed  to  Achan  as  the  thief.  He  was 
forced  to  tell  where  he  had  hidden  his  stolen  goods.  The  gold 
and  silver  and  the  clothes  were  thrown  into  the  fire. 

When  this  had  been  done,  the  soldiers  turned  upon  Achan 
and  killed  him. 

For  a  long  time  afterwards,  a  small  pile  of  stones  in  the 
valley  of  Achor  reminded  the  passerby  of  the  fate  of  the  first 
Jewish  soldier  who  had  dared  to  disobey  the  laws  of  Jehovah. 

Joshua  withdrew  his  troops  and  then  made  his  plans  for  a 
new  attack  upon  the  defiant  city. 

He  divided  his  army  into  two  parts.  During  the  night, 
thirty  thousand  men  hid  themselves  in  the  hills  of  Bethel,  just 
outside  of  Ai.  Later  on,  five  thousand  more  were  added  to 
their  number. 

With  five  thousand  others,  Joshua  boldly  marched  upon  the 
gates  of  Ai.  The  garrison,  when  they  saw  this  small  group 
of  Jews,  believed  that  they  had  to  deal  with  the  remnant  of 
those  same  forces  which  they  had  defeated  a  few  days  before. 

They  laughed  out  loud,  and  they  left  the  walls  of  the 


FINDING  NEW  PASTURES 


lOT 

fortress  to  punish  this  recklessness  out  in  the  open,  where  it 
is  easier  to  kill  your  enemies. 

But  Joshua  did  not  wait  for  them.  Followed  by  his  soldiers, 
he  fled  away  in  the  direction  of  the  mountains. 

Then  the  men  from  Ai  threw  all  prudence  to  the  winds 
and  they  too  ran  as  fast  as  they  could.  Soon  they  found  them¬ 
selves  in  a  narrow  gorge.  There  Joshua  halted. 

He  waved  a  piece  of  cloth 
on  the  top  of  a  spear  as  a  sign 
for  the  men  who  were  in  ambush 
in  the  western  hills.  They 
rushed  out  of  their  trenches  and 
they  attacked  the  Ai-ites  in  the 
rear.  Caught  between  two 
fires,  the  heathen  were  entirely 
at  the  mercy  of  the  Jews. 

A  few  hours  later,  they 
were  all  dead.  And  as  for  Ai, 
it  was  captured  without  any 
difiSculty,  as  the  city  gates  were 
still  wide  open. 

The  citizens,  men,  women  and  children,  shared  the  fate  of 
the  people  of  Jericho.  They  were  all  killed  and  the  town  was 
burned  down.  That  evening,  the  reddened  sky  of  Canaan  told 
for  a  second  time  of  the  arrival  of  this  new  and  victorious 
invader,  who  claimed  all  Canaan  as  his  own  and  who  showed 
no  mercy  to  those  who  dared  to  oppose  themselves  against 
his  will. 

In  their  fear,  a  few  of  the  Canaanite  cities  tried  to  escape 
their  ultimate  fate  by  the  use  of  strategy. 

One  of  them  almost  succeeded.  That  was  the  city  of 
Gibeon. 


108 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


“The  Jews/’  so  the  Gibeonites  argued,  “have  come  to 
settle  here  for  all  time.  They  are  so  powerful  that  we  cannot 
fight  them.  We  shall  have  to  make  terms  with  them  as  best 
we  can.  They  will  soon  be  in  our  neighbourhood.  Suppose 
that  we  make  them  believe  that  our  city  is  really  a  thousand 
miles  away.  In  that  case,  they  will  perhaps  make  a  treaty 
with  us  and  they  will  never  dis¬ 
cover  that  our  village  is  just 
off  the  main  road.” 

It  was  a  clever  bit  of  rea¬ 
soning  and  at  first,  it  was  quite 
successful.  Late  one  evening,  a 
delegation  of  people  from  the 
city  of  Gibeon  came  to  the 
Jewish  camp  and  asked  to  be 
taken  to  the  tent  of  Joshua. 

The  poor  fellows  were  in  a 
dreadful  state  of  exhaustion. 

They  could  hardly  walk.  Their 
clothes  were  covered  with  mud  and  they  seemed  exhausted 
from  lack  of  water.  They  carried  a  little  food,  but  it  was 
mouldy  and  they  explained  that  it  had  been  spoiled  during 
the  days  and  days  and  days  they  had  been  obliged  to  march 
before  they  had  reached  the  Jewish  camp. 

Joshua  believed  this  story. 

He  asked  the  men  whence  they  came  and  they  answered 
that  they  were  from  the  city  of  Gibeon,  which  was  so  far  away 
from  the  Jewish  camp  that  the  envoys  had  almost  perished 
along  the  road. 

Then  they  told  the  Jewish  commander  how  their  fellow- 
citizens  wished  to  live  in  peace  with  the  new  arrivals  and  would 
like  to  conclude  a  treaty  of  amity  and  they  pointed  out  how 


THE  GIBEONITES  COME  TO 
JOSHUA  IN  AN  EXHAUSTED 
CONDITION 


FINDING  NEW  PASTURES 


109 


easy  it  would  be  to  live  in  peace  with  people  whose  city  was 
a  thousand  miles  away. 

It  sounded  very  reasonable  and  Joshua  fell  into  the  trap. 
Too  late  did  he  discover  that  Gibeon  was  right  on  the  route 
which  he  proposed  to  follow.  He  had  promised  to  spare  the 
lives  of  the  Gibeonites.  He  could  not  break  his  sacred  word, 
but  in  his  anger  he  condemned  the  Gibeonites  to  be  the  slaves 
of  the  Jews  for  all  time. 

And  so,  although  the  Gibeonites  and  their  children  were 
spared,  they  became  hewers  of  wood  and  drawers  of  water 
and  had  to  work  for  the  benefit  of  the  Jews  without  receiving 
any  wages.  This  was  a  sad  fate,  but  worse  was  to  follow  as 
soon  as  the  other  tribes  of  Canaan  heard  what  had  happened. 

These  others  were  no  cowards  and  were  willing  to  fight  for 
their  own.  Jericho  and  Ai  had  been  destroyed  and  now  a  pow¬ 
erful  city,  a  possible  ally  in  the  war  for  defence,  surrendered 
without  shooting  a  single  arrow.  It  was  perfectly  disgraceful 
and  it  deserved  severe  punishment  before  others  followed  this 
cowardly  example. 

Then  and  there,  under  the  leadership  of  Adoni  Zedec,  the 
ruler  of  Jerusalem,  five  kings  made  a  treaty  and  promised  each 
other  to  make  common  cause  against  the  Jews  and  against 
those  who  should  accept  their  rule.  They  called  together  their 
armies  and  they  marched  against  Gibeon  to  punish  the  city 
for  its  treason. 

The  Gibeonites,  caught  between  two  dangers,  sent  mes¬ 
sengers  to  Joshua  and  asked  him  to  come  to  their  assistance. 

Joshua  knew  that  this  was  to  be  the  decisive  battle.  By 
forced  marches  he  reached  the  neighbourhood  of  Gibeon  long 
before  the  allies  were  even  aware  of  his  presence.  He  caught 
them  entirely  unprepared.  There  was  no  battle,  for  the  troops 
of  the  five  kings  ran  away.  As  for  the  kings  themselves,  they 


110 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


tried  to  hide  in  a  cave  and  hoped  that  the  pursuing  Jews  would 
not  be  in  too  great  a  hurry  to  find  them. 

But  they  were  discovered. 

A  few  heavy  stones  were  hurriedly  rolled  against  the  mouth 
of  the  cave.  In  this  way,  it  was  turned  into  a  prison,  while 
the  men  of  Joshua  continued  the  pursuit  of  their  enemies,  to 
deal  with  the  kings  at  their  own  leisure. 

Meanwhile,  however,  the 
allied  forces  had  regained  some 
of  their  courage.  They  too, 
understood  that  they  were  en¬ 
gaged  in  the  last  great  fight  for 
freedom  and  independence. 

They  made  halt  and  ren¬ 
dered  desperate  resistance.  If 
they  could  only  hold  out  a  few 
hours  longer,  it  would  be  night 
and  they  might  be  able  to  es¬ 
cape. 

Joshua  needed  a  victory 
then  and  there  or  all  might  be  lost.  Once  more  he  called  upon 
Jehovah  for  help.  Immediately  Jehovah  ordered  the  sun  to 
stand  still  upon  Gibeon  and  he  ordered  the  moon  to  stand  still 
in  the  valley  of  Ajalon. 

In  this  way,  it  remained  bright  daylight  for  another  twelve 
hours.  The  Jewish  troops  were  able  to  continue  their  attacks. 
They  were  victorious  and  when  at  last  the  sun  went  down,  the 
children  of  Israel  were  masters  of  the  entire  land  of  Canaan. 

Even  then  they  did  not  rest.  They  returned  to  the  cave 
where  they  had  imprisoned  the  allied  leaders.  They  took  the 
King  of  Jerusalem  and  the  King  of  Hebron  and  the  King  of 
Lachish  and  the  King  of  Eglon  and  the  King  of  Jarmuth  and 


FINDING  NEW  PASTUBES 


in 


they  killed  them  all  as  an  example  for  the  thirty-odd  other 
rulers  of  Canaan  who  soon  afterward  surrendered  upon  such 
terms  as  Joshua  was  willing  to  grant. 

Then  J oshua  rested  upon  his  laurels. 


THE  SUN  STANDS  STILL 


At  Shiloh,  which  was  situated  halfway  between  Shechem 
and  Gilgal,  he  built  a  tabernacle  that  the  town  might  become 
the  spiritual  centre  of  the  new  Jewish  nation. 

As  for  the  conquered  territory,  it  was  divided  among  the 


112 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


tribes  which  had  shared  equally  in  the  hardships  of  the  desert 
and  which  were  now  equally  rewarded  for  their  valour  and  their 
endurance. 

In  this  way  did  the  Jews  at  last  find  a  home  of  their  own. 

After  many  centuries  of  city  life  and  after  the  interminable 

journey  in  the  desert,  they  could  at  last  return  to  the  simple 

ways  of  their  ancestors,  as  Moses  had  wanted  them  to  do. 

» 

They  were  no  longer  forced  to  live  in  the  slums  of  Egyptian 
towns.  Once  more  they  were  shepherds. 

Each  man  owned  a  little  piece  of  land  and  every  family 
possessed  a  house  which  was  its  castle. 

And  the  scattered  tribes  of  a  former  age  now  belonged  to 
a  strong  nation  which  recognised  one  common  ideal,  the  worship 
of  Jehovah,  the  Master  of  Heaven  and  of  earth,  who  had  led 
them  out  of  slavery  into  the  free  independence  of  a  powerful 
state. 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  CANAAN 


CHAPTER  IX 

UNDER  A  NUMBER  OF  ENERGETIC  LEADERS,  A  JEWISH 
NATION  WAS  FINALLY  ESTABLISHED  IN  THE  COUN¬ 
TRY  WHICH  FORMERLY  HAD  BELONGED  TO  THE 
CANAANITES 


HE  land  had  been  conquered.  The 
original  inhabitants  had  been  killed  or 
had  been  driven  into  slavery.  But 
much  remained  to  be  done  before  the 
Jews  were  really  to  become  the  recog¬ 
nised  masters  of  all  Palestine,  as  we 
now  call  the  western  part  of  Asia  along 
the  shores  of  the  Mediterranean. 

Joshua  had  died  the  peaceful  death  of  old  age.  The  tribes 
had  buried  him  with  great  solemnity.  Then  they  decided  not 
to  appoint  a  successor. 

Now  that  the  fighting  was  over,  it  seemed  quite  unnecessary 
to  have  a  commander-in-chief.  The  high  priest  at  Shiloh  would 
undoubtedly  interpret  the  laws  of  Jehovah  whenever  the  occa¬ 
sion  arose.  Meanwhile,  the  election  of  a  new  military  leader 
would  only  call  forth  the  old  rivalry  between  the  different 
families  of  prominence.  Besides,  there  had  been  so  much 

113 


114 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


fighting  these  last  years  that  people  wanted  to  get  away  from 
all  things  military.  They  dreamed  of  peace  and  talked  of 
ploughshares. 

But  soon  it  became  clear  that  a  nation  (a  new  nation  at 
that),  surrounded  on  all  sides  by  enemies,  could  not  expect 
to  survive  unless  there  was  at  least  a  nominal  head. 

The  little  kings  of  Canaan  had  been  an  easy  match  for  the 
well-trained  troops  of  Moses  and  Joshua.  But  beyond  the 
western  border  there  lived  the  mighty  rulers  of  the  Mesopo¬ 
tamian  valley,  and  one  of  those,  the  ruler  of  Babylon,  was 
from  the  beginning  a  serious  menace  to  the  safety  of  the  young 
Jewish  state. 

When  he  marched  against  Canaan  and  took  several  of  the 
outlying  districts,  the  Jews  were  forced  to  reconsider  their 
original  decision.  They  were  not  quite  willing  to  turn  their 
state  into  a  regular  kingdom,  but  they  tacitly  accepted  the 
absolute  rule  of  a  single  leader  whom  they  called  their  ‘‘Judge.” 
(After  two  or  three  centuries,  the  power  of  the  Judges  was 
greatly  increased  and  out  of  this  high  office  grew  the  Jewish 
kingdom  of  which  you  shall  hear  a  great  deal  in  the  following 
chapters.) 

The  first  of  these  Judges  was  a  certain  Othniel.  He  had 
made  a  reputation  for  himself  as  the  officer  under  whose  com¬ 
mand  the  town  of  Kirjath-Sepher,  the  capital  of  the  giant 
Anakim,  had  been  taken.  These  same  Anakim,  a  generation 
before,  had  frightened  the  followers  of  Moses  by  their  size 
and  their  strength,  but  now  they  were  all  dead  or  reduced  to 
poverty,  and  as  harmless  as  our  own  Indians.  Othniel  had 
another  claim  to  distinction.  He  had  married  the  daughter 
of  Caleb,  who  forty  years  before,  together  with  Joshua,  had 
gone  to  the  land  of  Eshcol  to  spy  it  out  for  Moses. 

Othniel  succeeded  in  driving  the  Babylonian  troops  back 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  CANAAN  115 

from  Jewish  territory,  and  thereafter,  he  was  the  uncrowned 
king  of  the  nation  for  ahnost  thirty  years. 

But  when  he  died,  the  Jews  relapsed  into  their  old  habit 
of  indifference.  They  married 
the  daughters  of  their  hea¬ 
thenish  neighbours.  They  took 
wives  from  among  the  few 
survivors  of  the  old  inhabi¬ 
tants  of  Canaan.  And  the 
children  of  such  unions  were 
apt  to  learn  the  language  and 
worship  the  gods  of  their 
mothers.  In  short,  the  Jews 
forgot  that  Jehovah  had  been 
their  leader  in  the  days  of  their 
hardship  and  that  without 
Him  they  were  merely  a  small 

Semitic  tribe  which  was  entirely  at  the  mercy  of  its  more 
powerful  neighbours. 

As  a  result,  they  soon  lost  that  feeling  of  a  common  destiny 
which  had  been  the  first  and  most  important  point  in  the 
nationalistic  programme  of  Moses.  They  began  to  quarrel 
among  themselves  and  when  news  of  this  internal  strife  reached 
their  ever  watchful  neighbours,  the  people  of  Moab  and  the 
people  of  Ammon  and  the  much  dreaded  Amalekites  made 
an  alliance,  and  within  a  short  time  they  reconquered  the  land 
which  only  a  few  years  before  they  had  lost  to  Joshua. 

The  Jewish  armies  were  defeated  and  there  followed  a  new 
period  of  slavery.  It  lasted  almost  twenty  years  and  during 
this  period,  the  Hebrew  tribes  recognised  Eglon,  the  King  of 
Moab,  as  their  master. 


THE  JEWS  FEARED  THE 
STRONGHOLDS  OF  THE 
MEN  OF  ANAK 


116 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


It  was  a  certain  Ehud,  a  member  of  the  tribe  of  Benjamin, 
who  at  last  delivered  his  people  from  their  bondage. 

Ehud  was  left-handed.  This  gave  him  an  unsuspected 
advantage.  He  hid  a  dagger  in  the  right  side  of  his  cloak. 
Of  course,  no  soldier  of  Eglon’s  body-guard  would  look  for 
a  sword  on  the  wrong  side  of  a  uniform. 

Thus  prepared,  Ehud  asked  to  be  admitted  into  the  presence 
of  Eglon.  He  said  that  he  was  the  bearer  of  some  secret 
information  and  that  he  must  have  a  few  minutes  with  His 
Majesty  alone.  Eglon,  sus¬ 
picious  like  all  Oriental  ty¬ 
rants,  expected  to  hear  news 
of  an  impending  revolt.  He 
sent  away  his  followers.  As 
soon  as  the  door  was  closed, 

Ehud  drew  his  dagger. 

Eglon  jumped  from  his  chair 
and  tried  to  defend  himself. 

It  was  too  late.  Ehud’s  dag¬ 
ger  was  in  his  heart.  He  fell 
down  dead. 

That  was  the  signal  for  a 
general  uprising  against  the  Moabites.  When  they  had  been 
driven  away,  Ehud,  in  recognition  of  his  services,  was  elected 
to  be  the  Judge  of  Israel,  and  once  more  his  people  enjoyed 
a  short  period  of  peace  and  comparative  independence. 

In  rapid  succession  the  Judges  thereafter  followed  each 
other.  Invariably  they  were  men  of  strong  character  who  spent 
their  days  fighting  the  heathen  along  the  frontier.  If  they 
had  lived  in  those  early  days,  I  am  certain  that  Captain  J ohn 
Smith  and  Daniel  Boone  would  have  been  among  the  great 
Jewish  Judges. 


THE  TOMB  OF  THE  GIANT 
ANAKIM 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  CANAAN 


117 


Unfortunately,  border  warfare  is  apt  to  be  very  brutal. 
Whenever  the  Philistines  burned  down  one  Hebrew  village, 
the  Jews  retaliated  by  destroying  two  Philistine  villages.  Then 
the  Philistines  thought  it  their  duty  to  plunder  three  Jewish 
villages  and  the  Jews,  on  their  side,  went  further  and  pillaged 
four  Philistine  villages.  It  was  an  endless  chain  of  mukial 
murder,  during  which  very  little  of  importance  was  accom¬ 
plished. 

But  almost  every  country,  during  the  early  period  of  settle¬ 
ment,  passes  through  such  an  agony  of  bloodshed.  It  would  be 
foohsh,  therefore,  to  blame  the  Jews  for  certain  crimes  which 
the  ancestors  of  all  of  us  have  committed  and  which  are  in  no 
way  typical  of  one  particular  race  of  men. 

Because  we  have  studied  the  Old  Testament  -  with  such 
great  care,  we  happen  to  know  more  Jewish  history  than  Baby¬ 
lonian  or  Assyrian  or  Hittite  history.  That  is  the  main  differ¬ 
ence.  For  certainly  those  other  inhabitants  of  western  Asia 
were  not  a  whit  better  than  their  Hebrew  neighbours.  And 
after  this  little  digression,  let  us  return  to  the  records  of  the 
sacred  Book. 

As  time  went  on,  the  war  along  the  frontier  became  increas¬ 
ingly  violent,  and  even  the  women  were  called  upon  to  do 
their  part.  The  little  cities  of  Canaan  were  no  longer  a  menace. 
One  by  one  they  had  been  conquered  and  destroyed.  One 
enemy,  however,  remained  as  dangerous  and  as  threatening  as 
before.  That  was  Philistia. 

We  shall  often  hear  the  name  of  the  Philistines  in  the  fol¬ 
lowing  pages.  Unlike  the  Jews  and  the  other  inhabitants  of 
western  Asia,  the  Philistines  did  not  belong  to  the  Semitic 
race. 

They  were  Cretans  and  they  had  left  their  native  island 
after  the  destruction  of  Cnossos,  the  famous  city  of  antiquity, 


118 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


which  for  almost  a  thousand  years  had  been  the  centre  of  the 
civilised  world. 

How  and  why  and  by  whom  that  city  had  been  destroyed, 
we  do  not  know.  The  survivors  of  the  tragedy  had  escaped 
by  sea.  First  of  all  they  had 
tried  to  establish  themselves  in 
the  delta  of  the  river  Nile. 

The  Egyptians,  however,  had 
driven  them  away. 

Then  they  had  sailed  west¬ 
ward  and  following  the  coast 
of  Asia  they  had  occupied  a 
narrow  slip  of  land  between 
the  Mediterranean  and  the 
hills  of  western  Judaea  which 
had  just  been  conquered  by 
J  oshua. 

Of  course  the  Jewish  tribes  would  have  liked  to  possess  a 
few  seaports  of  their  own,  and  the  Philistines  wanted  all  the 
land  up  to  the  river  Jordan.  This  led  to  everlasting  warfare 
between  the  land-locked  J ewish  states  and  their  seafaring  Phi¬ 
listine  neighbours.  But  as  the  Cretans  were  far  ahead  of  their 
Asiatic  neighbours  in  the  arts  of  peace  (and  therefore  in  the 
art  of  war)  it  was  not  possible  for  the  rude  tribes  of  Israel  to 
make  much  headway  against  their  enemies  of  Philistia  for 
Philistina  or  Palestine,  as  we  now  call  that  country). 

Many  of  the  most  famous  battles  of  the  Old  Testament 
occurred  during  eight  centuries  of  strife  between  the  two  great 
competitors  for  the  Mediterranean  coast  and  almost  invariably 
the  former  Cretans,  with  their  copper  shields  and  their  iron 
swords  and  their  armoured  chariots  (a  sort  of  ancient  tank) 
were  able  to  defeat  the  Jews,  whose  wooden  shields  and  stone- 


THE  FRONTIER  BETWEEN  THE 
LANDS  OF  THE  JEWS  AND 
THE  PHILISTINES 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  CANAAN  119 

pointed  arrows  and  slingshots  only  occasionally  saved  them 
from  defeat. 

Once  in  a  while,  however,  when  the  Hebrew  tribes  were 
conscious  of  the  fact  that  they  were  fighting  the  cause  of 


THE  PHILISTINES  LAND  IN  PHILISTIA  OR  PALESTINE 


Jehovah,  they  gained  a  victory  and  one  such  triumph  occurred 
during  the  lifetime  of  Deborah  the  Prophetess. 

Shamgar  the  Judge  had  just  died.  Immediately  the 
soldiers  of  King  Jabin  had  marched  across  the  frontier.  They 
had  stolen  the  cattle.  They  had  killed  the  men.  And  they 
had  carried  away  the  women  and  children.  The  attack  called 
for  revenge,  but  who  was  to  lead  the  Jews? 

The  armies  of  J abin  were  commanded  by  a  foreigner  named 


120 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Sisera.  He  seems  to  have  been  an  Egyptian  who  had  come 
north  to  make  a  career.  Like  most  professional  soldiers,  he 
was  well  versed  in  the  most  recent  methods  of  warfare.  He 
established  a  special  corps  of  iron-clad  chariots.  Those  were 
pulled  by  horses  and  they  slashed  their  way  through  the  Jewish 
ranks  with  the  ease  of  a  knife  cutting  through  butter.  It  was 
said  that  Sisera  had  not  less  than  nine  hundred  of  these 
armoured  cars.  This  number  was  probably  somewhat  exagger¬ 
ated,  but  the  Egyptian  was  powerful  enough  to  threaten  the 
young  J ewish  state  with  complete  annihilation  and  great  was 
the  fear  in  the  valleys  and  among  the  hills  on  both  sides  of  the 
river  Jordan. 

Now  it  happened  at  that  time  that  near  the  village  of  Bethel 
there  lived  a  woman  by  the  name  of  Deborah. 

She  enjoyed  that  strange  gift  which  had  made  Joseph  so 
famous  as  a  child.  She  could  predict  the  future. 

Little  wonder  that  people  came  from  all  parts  of  western 
Asia  to  ask  her  advice  before  they  started  upon  a  voyage  or 
went  to  war  or  entered  upon  new  business  or  got  married. 

To  her  the  Jews  turned  and  begged  that  she  tell  them  what 
to  do.  Fortunately,  Deborah  was  a  woman  of  courage.  She 
did  not  advise  her  fellow  countrjmien  to  surrender.  On  the 
contrary,  she  told  them  to  fight. 

She  sent  word  to  the  tribe  of  Naphtali,  and  asked  that  a 
man  by  the  name  of  Barak  come  to  see  her.  Barak  had  a 
certain  local  reputation  as  a  soldier.  But  when  Deborah  told 
him  to  march  boldly  against  Sisera,  he  hesitated.  “It  will  end 
in  disaster,”  he  said,  “Our  troops  cannot  hold  their  own 
against  those  iron  chariots.” 

Deborah  answered  that  Jehovah  would  be  with  the  Jewish 
army  as  soon  as  they  took  the  offensive,  and  would  make  them 
invisible.  But  Barak  still  had  a  vision  of  those  nine  hundred 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  CANAAN  121 

armoured  cars  and  he  declined  the  honour  of  being  made  com- 
mander-in-chief. 

In  utter  despair,  Deborah  then  offered  to  accompany  him, 
if  this  would  give  him  courage.  At  the  same  time  she  warned 
him  that  now  the  glory  of  the  coming  victory  would  not  go  to 
him  but  to  a  woman.  Then 
at  last  Barak  gave  in  and  or¬ 
dered  his  soldiers  to  leave  the 
safe  fortress  of  Mount  Tabor. 

Sisera  had  drawn  up  his 
line  of  chariots  in  the  plains  of 
J ezreel.  There  he  attacked 
the  J ews  when  they  came  down 
from  the  hills.  Jehovah,  how¬ 
ever,  was  on  the  side  of  the 
Jews.  The  armies  of  Jabin 
fought  a  desperate  battle,  but 
they  were  doomed  to  destruc¬ 
tion.  The  few  survivors  fled  and  even  mighty  Sisera  was 
forced  to  leave  his  armoured  car  and  to  make  his  escape  on  foot. 

Westward  he  ran,  but  unaccustomed  to  this  unusual  exer¬ 
cise,  he  was  soon  tired  out  and  he  entered  a  house  that  stood 
by  the  side  of  the  road  and  asked  for  food. 

It  was  the  house  of  Heber,  the  Kenite. 

Heber  was  away,  but  his  wife  Jael  was  at  home. 

She  had  heard  of  the  battle.  She  knew  that  the  man  before 
her  must  be  Sisera,  for  he  looked  like  a  foreigner  and  his  helmet 
was  of  gold  and  he  ordered  the  woman  about  like  a  man  who 
is  accustomed  to  give  orders.  And  so  Jael  gave  her  unwelcome 
guest  to  eat  and  to  drink,  and  then,  as  the  man  was  plainly 
exhausted,  she  told  him  that  he  might  rest  on  some  rugs  on  the 
floor.  Meanwhile,  so  she  promised,  she  would  keep  watch  and 


THE  LONELY  HOUSE 
OF  DEBORAH 
THE  PROPHETESS 


122 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


if  any  Jewish  soldiers  came  near  her  house,  she  would  warn 
the  Egyptian  that  he  might  escape. 

Sisera  believed  everything  J ael  said,  and  soon  he  was  fast 
asleep. 

Then  Jael  took  a  large  spike  (such  as  was  used  in  those  days 
for  a  tent-peg)  and  she  drove  it  through  the  eye  of  Sisera  and 
she  killed  her  enemy  on  the  floor  of  her  own  home,  and  she  ran 
to  the  soldiers  of  Barak  and  proudly  told  them  of  what  she 
had  done. 

That  was  the  end  of  the  story.  For  Jabin,  without  his 
trusted  general,  was  forced  to  make  peace  and  once  more  the 
Jews  were  free  and  they  were  very  proud  of  what  Jael  and 
Deborah  had  done  for  them  and  they  bestowed  great  honours 
upon  them. 

Unfortunately  such  periods  of  comparative  rest  seem  to 
have  been  very  bad  for  the  general  morale  of  the  people.  The 
worship  of  Jehovah,  as  it  had  been  ordered  by  Moses,  asked 
for  eternal  vigilance.  But  it  is  not  easy  to  be  interested  in 
spiritual  affairs  when  our  lives  are  comfortable  and  when  we 
do  not  have  a  single  care  in  the  whole  wide  world  except  the 
problem  of  how  to  spend  our  money  as  pleasantly  as  we  pos¬ 
sibly  can. 

And  those  stories  which  have  come  down  to  us  from  the 
days  following  immediately  upon  the  defeat  of  Sisera  show 
clearly  how  the  great  God  of  the  wind-swept  desert  had  been 
completely  forgotten  and  how  His  laws  were  held  in  contempt 
by  the  younger  generation,  which  ate  and  drank  and  generally 
amused  itself  without  a  thought  for  the  problems  of  to-morrow. 

Take,  as  an  example,  the  unpleasant  tale  of  Micah,  the 
only  son  of  a  rich  widow,  who  lived  in  the  village  of  Ephraim. 
Micah  stole  money  that  belonged  to  his  mother,  but  when 
she  found  it  out,  she  not  only  forgave  him,  but  ordered  the  gold 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  CANAAN 


123 


and  the  silver  to  be  melted  and  made  into  an  idol  as  a  present 
for  her  darling  boy. 

Micah  liked  the  shining  plaything,  and  he  had  a  little  taber¬ 
nacle  built  inside  his  house  and  then  he  hired  one  of  the  mem¬ 
bers  of  the  tribe  of  Levi  (who  were  the  hereditary  keepers  of 
the  real  tabernacle)  to  become  his  own  private  priest  and  offi¬ 
ciate  for  him,  so  that  he  would 
not  have  to  leave  his  house 
when  he  wanted  to  go  to  church. 

All  this  offended  horribly 
against  the  ancient  laws,  as 
they  had  been  revealed  to 
Moses. 

It  even  shocked  the  other 
Jews,  who  by  this  time  were 
none  too  pious. 

Micah,  however,  was  rich, 
and  did  as  he  pleased. 

But  one  day  his  house  was 
broken  into  by  some  people 
from  the  tribe  of  Dan,  who  were  travelling  westward,  looking 
for  fresh  pastures  for  their  cattle.  They  stole  Micah’s  golden 
idol  and  carried  it  to  their  own  village. 

As  for  the  Levite  who  was  supposed  to  be  Micah’s  priest, 
he  ran  away  as  soon  as  the  image  was  gone,  and  offered  his 
services  to  the  man  who  had  just  robbed  his  master. 

Jehovah  certainly  had  cause  to  be  displeased,  and  he  soon 
showed  his  resentment. 

He  sent  the  Midianites  against  the  land  of  Israel.  They 
came  every  summer  with  dreadful  regularity  and  stole  the 
barley  and  the  grain  that  stood  in  the  fields.  They  spread  such 
terror  among  the  Jewish  villages  that  the  inhabitants  used  to 


MICAH  BUILT  HIMSELF  A  TEM¬ 
PLE  WITH  A  STRANGE  IDOL 
IN  IT 


124  THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

flee  to  their  mountain  caves  as  soon  as  the  first  of  the  Midianite 
bands  appeared  and  often  remained  there  all  winter.  At  last, 
in  utter  despair,  they  did  not  evenl3other  to  raise  further  crops. 
Soon  there  was  famine  in  the  land  and  people  began  to  die  from 
starvation. 

Onlv  here  and  there  a  man  of  stout  heart  still  cultivated  his 
fields,  and  among  those  was  a  certain  J oash,  who  was  the  father 
of  Gideon.  Joash  himself  was  none  too  faithful  to  the  'laws 
of  his  country.  He,  too,  worshipped  the  strange  gods  who 
had  been  dear  to  the  hearts  of  the  original  inhabitants  of  the 
land.  His  son,  however,  who  like  Deborah  and  Joseph,  could 
make  prophecies,  had  remained  faithful  to  the  old  creed. 

When  his  father  erected  an  altar  to  Baal,  young  Gideon 
(encouraged  by  a  dream  in  which  an  angel  made  a  rock  devour 
some  food  which  he  had  placed  before  it)  got  up  in  the  middle  of 
the  night,  knocked  down  the  ugly  old  idol  and  on  the  same 
spot  erected  an  offering-place  to  the  service  of  Jehovah. 

In  the  morning  when  the  people  of  the  village  in  which 
Joash  lived  discovered  the  broken  pieces  of  stone  and  realised 
what  had  happened,  they  ran  to  the  house  of  Joash  and  they 
shouted  that  he  must  punish  his  boy  for  his  terrible  sacrilege. 

F  ortunately,  J  oash  was  a  man  of  some  common  sense.  He 
said  that  if  Baal  were  really  as  powerful  as  people  claimed,  he 
would  undoubtedly  kill  Gideon  for  what  he  had  just  done.  But 
Gideon  continued  to  live  quite  happily  and  at  the  end  of  a  few 
weeks,  when  nothing  at  all  had  happened,  the  neighbours 
changed  their  mind.  In  this  way,  Gideon,  who  became  known 
far  and  wide  as  Jerub-baal  (or  the  Baal-altar-smasher) ,  became 
a  popular  hero,  whose  fame  spread  to  the  other  cities. 

When  at  last  the  Midianites  became  so  bold  in  their  attacks 
that  the  Jews  were  forced  to  take  the  offensive  or  perish  alto¬ 
gether,  it  was  quite  natural  that  Gideon  should  be  asked  to  be 


125 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  CANAAN 

their  leader.  He  gathered  some  sort  of  army  together  in 
the  ancient  plain  of  Jezreel  and  tried  to  drill  it  into  shape 
for  the  coming  campaign.  The  spirit  of  his  troops,  however, 
was  very  bad.  They  were  not  really  interested  in  the  war. 
They  had  grown  soft.  They 
wanted  to  return  to  their  snug 
caves  and  preferred  hunger  to 
physical  hardship. 

When  Gideon  asked  them 
whether  they  would 
like  to  go  home,  the  majority 
shouted,  “Yes!  the  sooner,  the 
better!” 

He  let  them  go  with  the  ex¬ 
ception  of  a  few  thousand  who 
seemed  fairly  reliable.  But 
even  these  he  could  not  trust, 
and  he  asked  Jehovah  to  give 
him  a  token  of  his  future  approval.  He  placed  some  wool 
upon  the  ground  outside  his  tent.  In  the  morning,  when  he 
picked  it  up,  it  was  drenched  with  dew.  The  grass,  however, 
upon  which  it  had  rested  had  remained  dry.  This  meant  that 
Jehovah  would  be  with  Gideon  in  the  coming  attack  and  that 
he  could  go  ahead  with  his  arrangements. 

Gideon  took  his  soldiers  out  for  a  long  march.  When  they 
were  quite  tired  out,  he  sent  them  to  the  river.  Only  three 
hundred  (out  of  a  total  of  several  thousand)  knew  enough  of 
the  business  of  war  to  watch  the  other  bank  of  the  flood  while 
they  drank.  They  also  used  their  hands  to  carry  the  water  to 
their  mouths.  The  others  leaned  forward  (like  so  many  thirsty 
animals)  and  lapped  up  the  water  without  further  ado. 

Gideon  kept  those  three  hundred.  The  others  were  dis- 


126 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


missed.  They  would  have  been  only  a  nuisance  when  it  came 
to  fighting. 

The  three  hundred  faithful  men  then  received  their 
instructions. 

Gideon  gave  each  of  them  a  ram’s  horn  and  a  torch.  The 
torch  was  hidden  in  an  earthen- ware  jar,  so  that  the  rays  of 

the  light  could  not  be  seen. 

In  the  middle  of  the  night, 
Gideon  led  his  men  against 
the  Midianites. 

While  they  were  running, 
they  all  blew  their  horns,  and 
at  a  given  signal,  they  broke 
the  earthen  jars.  The  sudden 
light  of  so  many  torches 
blinded  the  Midianites.  They 
were  thrown  into  a  panic  (as 
happens  so  often  with  eastern 
people)  and  they  fled.  Thou¬ 
sands  of  dead  and  wounded  were  left  upon  the  field  of  battle. 

As  for  Gideon,  he  was  recognised  as  the  uncrowned  king  of 
the  Jews  and  he  was  their  Judge  for  many  years. 

But  after  his  death  there  was  more  trouble.  Gideon  had 
been  married  several  times  and  he  left  quite  a  large  family.  No 
sooner  was  he  buried  than  his  sons  began  to  quarrel  to  see 
who  should  succeed  their  father.  One  of  them,  by  the  name  of 
Abimelech,  was  very  ambitious.  He  wanted  to  be  King  of  all 
the  Jews  and  he  thought  that  he  had  the  necessary  qualifica¬ 
tions.  Such  young  men  are  rarely  appreciated  by  those  who 
know  them  best.  Abimelech  therefore  left  his  home  and  went 
to  the  village  of  Shechem,  where  his  mother’s  people  came 
from.  In  Shechem  he  began  to  plot  for  the  throne.  He  had 


THE  JEWS  WATCHED  THE 
MIDIANITES  LEAVING 
THEIR  HOMES 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  CANAAN 


127 


no  funds,  but  the  Shechemites,  who  could  see  the  advantage 
of  his  plan  (if  he  were  successful)  gave  him  a  loan,  and  with 
the  money  he  hired  a  few  professional  cut-throats  and  told  them 
to  murder  his  brothers. 

In  one  single  night,  all  the  sons  of  Gideon  were  killed,  with 
the  exception  of  the  youngest,  whose  name  was  Jotham. 

Jotham  ran  away  and  hid  in  the  mountains. 

Abimelech,  however, 
was  acclaimed  King  by 
the  people  of  Shechem, 
and  there  was  a  great  cele¬ 
bration. 

During  the  next  four 
years,  Abimelech  and  his 
chief  lieutenant,  Zebul, 
maintained  themselves 
and  forced  several  other 
villages  and  cities  to  rec¬ 
ognise  their  rule.  Once 
in  a  while  they  heard  of 
J otham.  The  boy  was 
apt  to  appear  unexpectedly  at  some  market-place,  to  denounce 
his  wicked  brother.  Abimelech,  however,  did  not  care. 
Jotham  did  not  have  a  penny  in  the  world  and  had  no  follow¬ 
ing.  His  violent  denunciations  of  his  bloodthirsty  brother 
were  a  futile  waste  of  words.  They  merely  amused  the  crowd. 

The  glory  of  Shechem,  however,  did  not  last  very  long. 
Abimelech  was  self-willed  and  stupid.  Soon  his  subjects  grew 
discontented.  A  man  named  Gaal  made  himself  the  centre  of 
an  insurrection.  In  the  fighting  which  followed,  Abimelech  and 
Zebul  were  victorious.  Gaal  and  his  men  were  driven  into  a 
high  stone  tower. 


THE  ATTACK  OF  GIDEON’S  MEN 


128  THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

When  Abimelech  could  not  capture  this  stronghold,  he  sent 
his  soldiers  into  the  forests  for  fire-wood.  This  he  heaped  up  in 
large  piles  at  the  foot  of  the  Tower  and  Gaal  and  his  followers 
were  all  burned  to  death. 

A  few  years  later,  however,  there  was  another  uprising  in 
the  town  of  Thebez.  Again  Abimelech  defeated  the  rebels  and 

for  a  second  time,  his  ene¬ 
mies  barricaded  them¬ 
selves  in  a  tower.  But 
when  Abimelech  tried  to 
roast  them  alive  (as  he 
had  done  with  the  people 
of  Shechem)  and  stepped 
proudly  forward  to  set 
fire  to  this  human  funeral 
pyre,  a  woman  leaned  out 
of  one  of  the  upper  stories 
and  threw  a  rock  at  him. 
That  rock  broke  his  back. 
F  oolish  Abimelech,  rather 
than  be  killed  by  a 
woman,  told  one  of  his  men  to  put  him  out  of  his  misery  before 
he  should  die  of  his  wound. 

For  a  short  while  afterwards  there  was  an  end  to  these 
ill-starred  efforts  to  unite  the  tribes  of  Israel  into  a  single  king¬ 
dom.  But  the  border  warfare  and  inter-tribal  strife  became 
worse  than  before.  First  the  Midianites  threatened  to  conquer 
all  the  lands  on  both  sides  of  the  Jordan.  A  few  years  later 
the  Ammonites  tried  to  do  the  same  thing. 

They  burned  and  plundered  so  many  villages  that  the  Jews 
forgot  their  own  quarrels  long  enough  to  fight  the  common 
enemy.  They  chose  Jephthah,  of  the  tribe  of  Manasseh,  as 


ABIMELECH  BURNS  THE 
TOWN  OF  SHECHEM 


129 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  CANAAN 

their  commander-in-chief.  Jephthah  was  9.  God-fearing  man 
and  soon  the  power  of  Ammon  was  broken. 

But  even  in  the  hour  of  victory,  the  old  quarrels  between 
the  tribes  continued  with  terrible  bitterness.  Some  of  the 
soldiers  accused  others  (who  belonged  to  the  tribe  of  Ephraim) 
of  having  been  lax  in  their  duties.  The  Ephraimites,  who 
unfortunately  for  themselves  had  arrived  upon  the  field  of 
battle  just  when  the  enemy  began  his  retreat,  answered  that 
the}^  were  sorry  but  that  they  could  not  help  being  late.  They 
had  had  to  come  all  the  way  from  the  other  side  of  the  river 
and  it  was  a  long  distance.  Jephthah,  however,  who  was  a 
good  deal  of  a  fanatic,  accepted  no  apologies,  and  would  not 
listen  to  explanations. 

He  sent  guards  to  all  the  fords  across  the  Jordan  and  gave 
orders  that  no  one  be  allowed  to  pass. 

Then  he  rounded  up  all  the  men  who  were  suspected  of 
belonging  to  the  treacherous  tribe.  It  was  easy  to  detect  them 
for  in  their  part  of  the  world  the  common  Hebrew  word  “shib¬ 
boleth”  (which  meant  river)  was  pronounced  “sibboleth,”  as 
the  Ephraimites  could  not  make  the  liquid  sound  expressed  by 
the  letters  “sh.”  Every  man  who  looked  as  if  he  might  be  an 
Ephraimite  was  made  to  say  “shibboleth.”  When  he  said  “sib- 
boleth,”  he  was  taken  to  the  gallows  and  executed. 

In  this  way,  so  the  Old  Testament  tells  us,  forty  thousand 
Ephraimites  were  killed  and  after  this  had  been  done,  Jephthah 
rode  home  to  keep  a  vow  which  he  had  made  to  Jehovah  just 
before  he  had  broken  the  ranks  of  the  Ammonites.  He  had 
promised  that  he  would  sacrifice  the  first  living  thing  which 
came  to  meet  him  when  he  reached  his  home.  He  had  probably 
thought  of  a  favourite  dog,  or  perhaps  a  horse.  But  unfortu¬ 
nately  it  was  his  only  daughter  who  rushed  forth  to  greet 
her  father. 


130 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 
Jephthah  kept  his  word. 

He  took  his  daughter  and  he  sacrificed  her  on  Jehovah’s 
altar  and  burned  her  body  and  peace  reigned  once  more  in  the 
land  of  Israel. 

The  story  is  growing  to  be  monotonous,  but  ere  long,  the 
Philistines  and  the  J ews  were  once  more  at  each  other’s  throats. 

The  fighting  was  more 
ferocious  than  ever  and 
whole  J ewish  communi¬ 
ties  were  exterminated. 

Then  Samson,  the 
great  national  hero  of  the 
Jews,  made  his  appear¬ 
ance.  He  was  as  strong 
as  Hercules  and  as  brave 
as  Roland,  but  not  as 
wise  as  many  of  the  other 
great  leaders  of  historical 
fame. 

He  was  the  son  of  a 
man  called  Manoah,  and 
even  as  a  child  he  was  known  for  his  tremendously  strong 
arms. 

He  was  not  a  nice  person  to  look  upon.  He  never  combed 
his  hair,  and  he  let  his  beard  grow  wild  and  he  rarely  bothered 
about  putting  on  clean  clothes.  But  he  had  hands  like  a 
pair  of  hammers  and  he  did  not  know  the  meaning  of  the 
word  “danger.” 

He  gave  his  parents  a  great  deal  of  trouble,  for  when  he 
was  eighteen  or  nineteen,  he  fell  in  love  with  a  Philistine  woman 
and  insisted  upon  marrying  her.  Of  course  his  own  people  and 
all  the  neighbours  were  horrified  at  the  idea  of  this  marriage 


THE  EPHRAIMITES  ARE  MADE  TO 
PRONOUNCE  “SHIBBOLETH” 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  CANAAN  131 

with  a  foreigner.  Samson,  however,  went  right  ahead  and 
travelled  to  Thamnata  to  claim  his  bride. 

On  the  way  west,  he  was  attacked  by  a  lion.  With  his  bare 
hands  he  picked  the  animal  up  as  if  it  had  been  a  kitten  and 
he  killed  it  and  threw  the  carcass  into  the  bushes  by  the  side 
of  the  road.  But  when  he  passed  the  same  spot  a  short  while 
afterwards,  he  found  that 
bees  had  made  a  home  in 
the  mouth  of  the  dead  ani¬ 
mal  and  were  busily  gath¬ 
ering  honey.  Samson 
took  the  honey  and  ate  it 
and  continued  his  jour¬ 
ney. 

Finally  he  reached  the 
village  where  his  bride 
lived  and  there  were  many 
parties  given  for  the 
happy  couple.  Samson 
tried  to  play  the  part  of 
the  merry  groom,  al¬ 
though  he  was  not  very  graceful  upon  such  occasions  and  was 
more  at  home  in  a  fight  than  in  a  parlour.  But  he  did  his  best, 
and  one  evening,  when  all  the  guests  were  amusing  each  other 
with  riddles,  he  offered  to  tell  a  little  story  of  his  own.  He 
promised  thirty  suits  of  clothes  to  the  guests  if  they  could  give 
him  the  correct  answer.  They  tried  but  they  could  not  do  it. 

For  this  is  what  Samson  had  asked:  “He  who  ate  was 
turned  into  food,  and  out  of  the  strong,  sweetness  poured 
forth.  What  is  it?” 

The  people  of  Thamnata  guessed  and  guessed  and  guessed, 
but  they  could  not  make  out  what  Samson  meant.  They  hated 


JEPHTHAH  RETURNS  HOME  AND  IS 
MET  BY  HIS  DAUGHTER 


132 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


to  look  foolish  before  this  unkempt  stranger  who  hailed  from 
the  hated  land  of  the  Jews  and  they  went  to  Samson’s  bride 
and  they  said :  “This  man  loves  you.  He  will  do  anything  for 
you.  Make  him  tell  you  the  answer  to  his  riddle.” 

The  woman  was  not  very  clever,  or  she  would  have  fore¬ 
seen  what  was  about  to  happen.  She  made  Samson’s  life 
miserable  until  he  snapped  at  her  that  he  had  meant  the  dead 
lion,  whose  carcass  was  now  a  prey  to  all  animals  and  whose 
mouth  had  been  turned  into  a  bee-hive. 

Then  the  Philistines  laughed  and  were  happy.  They  went 
to  Samson  and  they  shouted:  “Your  question  was  easy.  Of 
course  we  know  the  answer,  for  what  is  stronger  than  a  lion 
and  what  is  sweeter  than  honey?” 

Then  Samson  knew  the  trick  that  had  been  played  upon 
him.  He  grew  terribly  angry  and  without  a  further  word 
he  left  the  wedding  feast  and  he  left  his  bride. 

He  walked  to  the  city  of  Ashkelon  where  he  came  upon  a 
group  of  harmless  Philistines.  He  killed  them  all,  thirty  in 
number.  He  took  their  clothes  and  sent  them  to  the  wedding 
guests  with  his  compliments  as  a  reward  for  solving  his  riddle. 
Then  he  returned  to  the  house  of  his  parents  and  sat  and  sulked. 

For  he  was  deeply  in  love  with  this  Philistine  girl  and  he 
could  not  well  keep  away  from  her.  He  suffered  the  sepa¬ 
ration  as  long  as  he  possibly  could  and  then  went  back  to  her 
in  the  hope  that  everything  might  be  set  right. 

But  he  came  too  late.  A  few  days  before,  the  girl  had  been 
married  to  another  man  of  her  own  tribe.  Samson  found 
himself  jilted.  That  was  too  much  for  his  pride,  and  he  meant 
to  have  his  revenge. 

He  went  into  the  mountains  and  he  caught  three  hundred 
foxes. 

He  took  them  by  couples  and  tied  their  tails  together  and 


133 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  CANAAN 

then  he  fastened  a  burning  torch  to  the  tails  of  each  couple 
and  let  them  run  wild.  The  poor  beasts  of  course  were  in 
dreadful  pain.  They  scattered  all  over  the  countryside  and  in 
their  agony,  in  order  to  extinguish  the  flames,  they  rolled  them¬ 
selves  around  in  the  grain  flelds  that  were  standing  ready  for 
the  harvest. 

The  dry  grain  caught  fire.  Next  the  flames  spread  to  the 
vineyards  and  to  the  olive  trees,  and  in  one  single  night  the 
land  of  the  Philistines  was  ruined  by  one  enormous  confla¬ 
gration. 

The  people  in  their  anger  did  a  very  foolish  thing.  They 
placed  all  the  blame  for  their  misery  upon  Samson’s  former 
bride.  They  attacked  her  house  and  lynched  the  girl  together 
with  her  father. 

When  Samson  heard  of  this,  he  gathered  together  all  the 
men  who  would  rally  to  him  and  he  invaded  the  land  of  the 
Philistines  and  he  slew  hundreds  of  them,  from  sheer  joy 
of  killing. 

Just  then  there  happened  to  be  peace  along  the  border  and 
Samson’s  little  private  campaign  made  him  very  unpopular 
with  certain  men  of  the  tribe  of  Judah  who  happened  to  live 
in  that  part  of  the  country  and  who  wanted  to  maintain  ami¬ 
cable  relations  with  their  Philistine  neighbours.  They  captured 
Samson  and  they  bound  his  hands  and  they  carried  him  to 
the  Philistines.  They  did  not  wish  to  be  responsible  for  the 
death  of  a  fellow  citizen.  They  therefore  decided  to  leave  the 
actual  execution  to  the  Philistines,  while  they  themselves  stood 
by  and  looked  on. 

When  the  Philistines  saw  the  men  from  Judah  and  their 
prisoner  come  down  the  road,  they  were  wild  with  joy.  Samson 
quietly  waited  until  they  had  almost  surrounded  him.  Then 
he  jerked  himself  loose,  picked  up  the  jaw-bone  of  a  dead 


134 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


donkey  that  was  lying  by  the  side  of  the  road,  rushed  upon 
the  Philistines  and  beat  them  to  death,  right  and  left. 

From  that  moment  on,  the  enemies  of  the  great  Jewish 
hero  knew  that  all  attempts  upon  Samson’s  life  were  hopeless. 

They  could  not  defeat  him  in  open  battle. 

They  must  try  to  destroy  him  in  some  underhanded  fash¬ 
ion. 

This,  too,  seemed  very  difficult. 

But  alas !  Samson  was  his  own  worst  enemy. 

He  was  forever  falling  in  love  with  this  and  that  and  the 
other  woman. 

Upon  such  occasions,  he  was  quite  reckless  and  did  not 
count  the  cost,  but  incurred  every  sort  of  risk  and  sacrificed 
the  safety  of  his  country  for  the  sake  of  his  own  pleasure. 

One  evening  the  Philistines  heard  that  Samson  had  gone 
to  visit  a  friend  in  the  town  of  Gaza. 

“At  last,”  said  they,  “we  have  caught  him!” 

They  closed  the  city  gates  and  waited  for  morning.  Samson 
would  be  obliged  to  pass  through  the  gates  on  his  way 
home  and  half  a  hundred  well  armed  men  were  waiting 
for  him. 

Samson  must  have  heard  of  this  plan.  He  got  up  in  the 
middle  of  the  night.  He  left  the  house.  He  tore  the  heavy 
gates  from  their  hinges.  He  loaded  them  upon  his  back  and 
carried  them  from  Gaza  to  Hebron.  There  he  left  them  stand¬ 
ing  as  a  warning  to  all  his  enemies. 

Apparently  the  man  was  invulnerable  and  even  the  Jews 
^who  did  not  love  his  uncouth  ways)  were  forced  to  recognise 
his  rights  as  their  leader.  They  made  him  their  Judge  and 
for  almost  twenty  years  Samson  ruled  over  Israel.  He  might 
have  died  in  the  full  glory  of  his  fame  as  a  strong  man  and 
as  a  frontier  fighter.  But  when  quite  an  old  man,  he  became 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  CANAAN  135 

involved  in  another  love  affair  with  a  Philistine  woman  and 
this  proved  to  be  fatal. 

The  girl  was  called  Delilah.  She  did  not  care  for  Samson 
the  least  little  bit.  Her  own  people,  however,  had  threatened 
to  kill  her  unless  she  married  Samson  and  then  discovered  the 
source  of  his  incredible  strength. 

She  was  promised  a  thousand  Philistine  dollars  if  she  would 
betray  her  husband,  but  if  she 
failed  (so  she  was  told)  she  was 
sure  to  be  stoned  to  death. 

As  soon  as  they  were  mar¬ 
ried,  she  began  to  flatter  her 
husband  because  he  was  so  much 
stronger  than  other  men.  One 
thing,  she  said,  she  had  always 
wanted  to  know.  How  did  her 
clever  husband  happen  to  have 
such  broad  shoulders  and  such 
powerful  arms?  Samson  merely 
laughed  and  told  her  a  foolish 
story.  His  strength,  so  he  answered,  would  disappear  as  soon 
as  he  was  bound  with  seven  fresh  twigs. 

Delilah  believed  him.  During  the  night  when  Samson  slept, 
she  allowed  her  Philistine  neighbours  to  come  into  the  house 
and  they  bound  her  husband  with  seven  green  twigs. 

The  noise  they  made  woke  up  Samson.  He  looked  around, 
saw  his  enemies,  shook  off  the  green  twigs  and  went  back  to 
bed,  while  the  Philistines  fled. 

Day  after  day,  this  game  was  repeated.  Samson  seemed 
to  find  enormous  amusement  in  the  fact  that  the  Philistines 
could  never  capture  him.  In  the  reckless  mood  of  a  young 


136 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


bridegroom,  he  told  Delilah  all  sorts  of  absurdities  about  the 
source  of  his  strength. 

It  would  have  been  better  for  him  had  he  left  this  woman 
who  cared  more  for  her  own  people  than  for  her  husband. 
But  he  was  too  much  in  love  to  do  anything  of  the  sort.  He 
stayed,  and  of  course,  in  the  end,  Delilah  wore  out  his  patience, 
and  one  night,  Samson  told  her  the  truth  and  how  he  would 
become  weak  and  defenseless  if  his  hair  were  shaven. 

Delilah  had  won  her  thousand  pieces  of  silver.  She  called 
the  Philistines.  Quietly  they  entered  the  house,  and  wMe 
Samson  was  lying  asleep,  Delilah  cut  his  hair. 

Suddenly  she  called  her  husband. 

“Wake  up!”  she  shouted.  “Wake  up!  Here  are  the 
Philistines!” 

With  a  smile,  Samson  got  to  his  feet.  He  had  often 
heard  that  cry  before  and  invariably  a  mere  scowl  on  his  part 
had  made  his  enemies  scatter  like  mice  before  a  cat. 

Alas!  his  strength  was  gone.  His  arms  hung  limp  by 
his  sides.  He  was  captured  and  bound.  The  Philistines  took 
him  and  they  put  out  his  eyes  and  threw  him  into  the  mill  of 
Gaza  to  grind  corn  for  the  people  who  had  so  often  trembled  at 
the  mere  mention  of  his  name. 

There  in  eternal  darkness,  Samson  had  time  to  repent 
of  his  reckless  bravery  and  to  make  his  peace  with  Jehovah. 

But  while  he  was  in  prison,  his  hair  was  beginning  to  grow 
long  again  and  the  Philistines  were  too  much  excited  by  their 
victory  to  think  of  such  an  unimportant  detail. 

Now  it  happened  one  fine  day  that  they  were  celebrating 
a  great  feast  in  honour  of  Dagon,  their  god. 

From  far  and  near  the  country  people  had  come  to  town 
to  be  present.  Suddenly  some  one  remembered  the  Jewish 
prisoner  in  the  mill.  “Let  us  bring  him  here,”  he  shouted. 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  CANAAN 


137 


“Let  us  bring  him  here!  It  will  be  fine  sport.  We  can  laugh 
at  the  old  man  and  we  can  throw  mud  at  him.  He  used  to 
kill  hundreds  of  our  people  and  now  his  strength  is  gone  and 
he  is  as  harmless  as  a  kitten.  Let  us  bring  him  here!” 

Samson  was  sent  for 
and  he  was  brought  to  the 
temple  that  all  the  Philis¬ 
tines  might  see  him  and 
revile  him  to  their  hearts’ 
content. 

By  the  shouts,  he 
knew  what  was  happen¬ 
ing.  He  asked  Jehovah 
to  grant  him  one  final 
prayer.  Let  him  have 
his  old  strength  for  a  sin¬ 
gle  moment. 

They  placed  Samson 
upon  a  chair  right  in  the 
centre  of  the  temple. 

There  he  sat  between  the  two  pillars  which  supported  the  roof. 

Slowly  his  fingers  touched  the  cold  stone. 

While  the  crowd  around  him  went  into  wild  yells  of  joy,  his 
hands  grasped  the  blocks  of  granite.  With  a  sudden  heaving 
of  his  broad  shoulders,  he  pushed  the  pillars  away  from  him. 

They  crashed  into  a  hundred  pieces. 

The  roof  fell  in. 

The  people  in  the  temple  and  those  on  the  roof  were  all 
killed.  And  underneath  the  ruins  lay  the  broken  body  of  a 
hero  who  in  death  had  atoned  for  the  foolish  mistakes  of  his 
youth. 

But  while  all  these  spectacular  events  were  taking  place. 


SAMSON  AT  WORK  IN  THE  MILL 


138 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


THE  DEATH  OF  SAMSON 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  CANAAN  139 

other  and  very  subtle  influences  were  at  work  to  change  the 
divided  Jewish  tribes  into  a  real  nation.  The  people  still  re¬ 
fused  to  call  their  ruler  a  King.  But  the  power  of  the  Judges 
was  being  steadily  increased.  Indeed,  if  there  had  been  a  man 
of  the  strength  of  character  of  Moses  or  Joshua,  the  Jews  would 
gladly  have  asked  him  to  be  their  sovereign. 

Eli,  however,  who  had  succeeded  Samson,  was  a  weak 
man.  As  for  his  two  sons,  Phineas  and  Hophni,  they  were 
despicable  characters.  They  lived  without  giving  a  single 
thought  to  Jehovah.  They  cared  only  for  the  pleasures  of  this 
world  and  used  their  father’s  high  position  in  the  state  to  do 
all  sorts  of  wicked  things. 

It  was  time  for  a  very  different  sort  of  leader,  and  of  course, 
he  was  found  at  the  right  moment.  This  was  the  famous 
prophet  Samuel. 

He  was  born  in  a  little  village  called  Hamah.  His  father 
was  called  Elkanah  and  the  name  of  his  mother  was  Hannah. 

For  many  years,  Hannah  had  had  no  children  and  she  used 
to  go  every  year  to  the  temple  in  Shiloh  to  pray  that  she  might 
be  given  a  son.  When  the  child  was  born,  his  happy  mother 
called  him  Samuel  and  when  he  was  old  enough  to  walk,  she 
took  him  to  Shiloh  and  asked  Eli  to  give  him  some  work  to  do 
in  the  temple  that  he  might  be  ever  in  the  presence  of  Jehovah. 

Eli  liked  the  boy,  who  was  very  bright,  and  because  he  had 
given  up  all  hopes  that  his  own  sons  would  amount  to  anything, 
he  began  to  train  little  Samuel  as  a  possible  successor. 

One  night,  when  Eli  was  closing  the  doors  of  the  sacred 
building,  he  heard  a  voice  calling  Samuel  by  name.  The  child, 
who  was  asleep  on  a  couch,  awoke  and  said:  “Yes,  master,  I  am 
here.  What  do  you  want?” 

Eli  answered  that  he  did  not  want  anything  and  that  he 
had  not  called. 


140 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


The  boy  lay  down  again,  but  for  a  second  time,  the  voice 
called,  “Samuel!” 

This  happened  three  times  in  succession.  Then  Eli  under¬ 
stood  that  it  was  Jehovah  who  had  spoken.  He  left  Samuel 
alone  and  J ehovah  thereupon  told  the  boy  that  the  sons  of  Eli 
must  be  killed  for  their  sins  because  their  wickedness  threatened 
to  destroy  all  of  the  people  of  Israel. 

The  next  morning,  Samuel  told  Eli  what  had  been  revealed 
to  him  the  night  before. 

Soon  all  the  people  heard  of  it.  Thereafter,  they  treated 
Samuel  with  great  respect  and  they  said  to  each  other  that 
the  boy  would  surely  grow  up  to  be  a  great  prophet  and  perhaps 
their  ruler. 

But  ere  that  day  came,  and  while  Eli  was  still  Judge,  the 
Philistines  had  once  more  taken  to  the  warpath. 

Now  it  was  the  habit  of  the  Jews,  whenever  they  went  forth 
to  battle,  to  carry  the  Ark  with  them. 

Phineas  and  Hophni,  being  the  sons  of  Eli,  who  was  both 
Judge  and  high-priest,  were  ordered  to  conduct  the  sacred 
shrine  to  the  Jewish  camp. 

This  they  did,  although  they  had  offended  against  all  the 
laws  of  the  land  and  had  greatly  displeased  Jehovah. 

The  Ark,  without  the  presence  of  the  spirit  of  Jehovah, 
was  just  a  plain  wooden  box.  Of  course  it  could  not  avert 
disaster  under  such  circumstances  and  the  battle  which  followed 
ended  with  a  terrible  defeat  for  the  Hebrew  army.  Not  only 
were  the  depraved  sons  of  Eli  killed,  but  the  Ark  itself  was 
captured  by  the  enemy.  When  news  of  this  disaster  reached 
Eli,  he  gave  a  great  sigh  and  died  and  Samuel  was  elected 
Judge  in  his  place. 

It  was  one  of  the  worst  days  in  all  Jewish  history. 

The  Holy  of  Holies,  which  had  been  carried  from  Egypt 


141 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  CANAAN 

to  the  land  of  Canaan  was  now  reposing  in  the  new  temple 
which  the  Philistines  had  erected  upon  the  ruins  of  the  ancient 
structure  destroyed  by  Samson.  It  was  a  war  trophy,  but  still 
able  to  influence  the  fate  of  nations  and  the  lives  of  men.  For 
no  sooner  had  the  Philistines  carried  the  Ark  into  the  presence 
of  Dagon  than  the  image 
of  their  god  was  struck 
down  by  invisible  hands 
and  was  broken  into  a 
thousand  pieces. 

The  Philistines,  in 
great  fear,  took  the  Ark 
away  and  carried  it  to  the 
city  of  Gath.  Immedi¬ 
ately  all  the  people  fell 
ill.  After  that  there  was 
no  end  to  the  ill-luck  of 
poor  Philistia.  They 
took  the  Ark  from  north 
to  south  and  from  east  to  west,  but  everywhere  disaster  fol¬ 
lowed.  Until,  in  utter  despair,  the  Philistines  fllled  the  Ark 
with  gold,  hoisted  it  onto  a  cart,  harnessed  two  cows  in  front 
of  the  cart,  and  set  the  animals  free  to  wander  whither  they 
pleased,  provided  they  took  this  terrible  curse  away  from 
their  country. 

The  driverless  cows  started  eastward.  One  beautiful  morn¬ 
ing,  some  Jewish  farmers  who  were  working  in  the  fields  saw 
the  wagon  with  its  holy  load  standing  in  the  middle  of  the  road. 
Hastily  they  built  an  altar  and  all  the  people  from  the  neigh¬ 
bourhood  flocked  together  to  worship.  Later  they  brought  the 
Ark  to  the  house  of  a  Levite  priest,  called  Abinadab.  There 
it  stood  until  it  was  taken  to  Jerusalem,  many  years  later,  when 


142 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


David  was  King  and  dreamed  of  building  that  famous  temple 
which  was  finally  constructed  by  his  son  Solomon. 

The  return  of  the  Ark  seemed  to  predict  the  coming  of  a 
better  day.  But  more  and  more  the  people  grew  tired  of  the 
loose  form  of  government  which  had  become  characteristic  of 
the  rule  of  the  Judges.  And  so  they  went  to  Samuel  and  asked 
him  what  they  should  do  in  case  of  his  death.  Samuel  too  had 
two  sons,  but  they  were  very  much  like  Phineas  and  Hophni  and 
no  one  cared  to  see  them  as  successors  to  their  father. 

Samuel  asked  Jehovah  to  tell  him  what  measures  dught  to 
be  taken. 

Jehovah  spoke  of  the  coming  of  a  king.  He  was  tired  of 
the  continued  disobedience  on  the  part  of  his  Jewish  wor¬ 
shippers.  For  a  long  time  they  had  been  clamouring  for  a  king 
of  their  own.  Very  well.  Jehovah  would  give  them  such  a 
king  as  they  deserved.  But  that  king  would  take  the  sons  of 
the  people  to  use  them  as  his  soldiers  and  he  would  take  their 
daughters  as  his  servants  and  he  would  take  their  grain  and 
their  oil  and  their  wine  to  feed  his  followers  and  he  would  take 
a  tenth  of  everything  his  subjects  possessed  and  he  would  rule 
them  with  a  rod  of  iron. 

When  the  tribes  heard  this  news,  they  were  actually  happy. 
It  was  their  ambition  to  become  a  mighty  empire  and  to  rival 
the  glories  of  Egypt  and  Babylonia  and  Assyria.  They  did 
not  count  the  cost  until  it  was  too  late.  When  they  had  ceased 
to  be  free  farmers  and  shepherds  and  had  become  the  slaves 
of  a  ruler  in  a  distant  city,  they  began  to  appreciate  what  they 
had  sacrificed  when  they  asked  Jehovah  to  take  away  their 
liberty. 


THE  STORY  OF  RUTH 


CHAPTER  X 


THE  STORY  OF  RUTH,  WHICH  SHOWS  US  THE  SIMPLE 
CHARM  OF  THE  EARLY  LIFE  IN  PALESTINE 


N  the  last  chapter,  which  told  the  story 
of  the  Hebrew  tribes  when  the  land  of 
Israel  was  being  ruled  by  the  Judges, 
there  was  much  talk  of  battle  and 
bloodshed,  and  we  have  been  forced  to 
describe  many  cruel  and  horrible  inci¬ 
dents.  There  was,  on  the  other  hand, 
a  different  side  to  Jewish  life  which 


was  very  charming. 

Of  that  we  shall  now  tell  you. 

There  lived  a  man  in  the  town  of  Bethlehem  who  was  called 
Elimelech.  The  name  of  his  wife  was  Naomi  and  they  had  two 
sons,  Chilion  and  Mahlon.  Elimelech  was  well-to-do,  but 
when  a  famine  came  to  the  region  around  Bethlehem,  he  lost 
everything  he  possessed. 

He  had  a  rich  cousin  whose  name  was  Boaz.  But  Elimelech 
was  too  proud  to  beg.  Rather  than  ask  for  assistance,  he  took 
his  wife  and  his  boys  and  moved  into  the  land  of  Moab  to  make 
a  new  start. 


143 


144 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Soon  he  was  hard  at  work.  But  he  died  quite  suddenly  and 
his  widow  was  left  with  the  care  of  her  two  sons 

They  were  decent  young  fellows.  They  helped  their  mother 
on  the  farm  and  when  they  were  old  enough,  they  married  girls 
from  a  nearby  Moabite  village  and  they  all  expected  to  end 
their  days  among  the  kindly  strangers  of  their  adopted  country. 

But  Chilion  and  Mahlon,  who  seemed  to  have  inherited 
their  father’s  weak  constitution,  were  both  stricken  with  illness 

and  one  died  within  a 
short  time  after  the  other. 
Their  mother,  bowed 
down  with  grief,  decided 
to  go  back  to  the  old 
country,  that  she  might 
spend  the  last  years  of  her 
life  among  people  whom 
she  had  known  from  child¬ 
hood  and  who  spoke  the 
language  with  which  she 
was  familiar. 

She  was  very  fond  of 
her  daughters-in-law,  but 
in  all  fairness  she  could 
not  ask  the  girls  to  follow  her.  She  told  them  so,  and  Orpah, 
the  widow  of  Chilion,  agreed  that  it  would  not  be  wise  for  her 
to  leave  her  village.  She  bade  Naomi  an  affectionate  farewell 
and  remained  in  the  land  of  Moab. 

Ruth,  however,  the  widow  of  Mahlon,  refused  to  leave  the 
old  woman,  who  was  now  all  alone  in  the  world.  She  had 
married  into  the  family  of  Elimelech.  She  had  forsaken  her 
own  people  for  those  of  her  husband.  She  decided  to  stay 
with  Naomi.  For  that,  she  felt,  was  her  duty.  She  declared 


RUTH  AND  NAOMI  LEAVE  FOR 
THE  OLD  HOME 


THE  STORY  OF  RUTH 


145 


that  nothing  could  ever  separate  her  from  the  mother  of  her 
dead  husband  and  embraced  her  tenderly. 

Together  the  two  women  travelled  to  Bethlehem. 

Of  course,  they  were  dreadfully  poor  and  they  had  no 
money  with  which  to  buy  bread.  But  years  before,  Moses, 
the  wise  law-giver  who  understood  the  plight  of  those  who 
sometimes  go  hungry,  had  ordained  that  the  gleanings  which 
were  left  after  the  harvest  must 
be  given  to  the  destitute.  The 
farmer  was  entitled  to  all  the 
grain,  but  the  little  bits  that  fell 
by  the  way  when  the  reaping 
was  being  done  belonged  by 
divine  right  to  those  who  owned 
no  land  of  their  own. 

When  T^aomi  and  Ruth 
reached  Bethlehem,  it  was  har¬ 
vest  time. 

Boaz,  the  cousin  of  Elime- 
lech,  and  his  men  were  out  in 
the  fields.  And  Ruth  followed  the  gleaners  that  she  might  get 
bread  for  Naomi. 

This  she  did  for  several  days. 

As  she  was  a  stranger  among  the  J ewish  women  of  Bethle¬ 
hem,  people  asked  questions  about  her.  Soon  every  one  knew 
her  story  and  finally  it  reached  the  ears  of  Boaz.  He  was 
curious  to  see  what  sort  of  girl  this  might  be  and  under  the 
pretext  of  inspecting  his  fields,  he  had  a  talk  with  her. 

When  it  was  time  for  the  noon  meal,  he  invited  her  to  sit 
down  with  him  and  the  workmen  and  he  gave  her  all  the  bread 
she  needed. 

Ruth  ate  only  a  little.  The  rest  she  took  home  to  Naomi, 
who  was  too  old  to  work. 


146 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Early  the  next  morning,  she  was  back  in  the  fields.  Boaz 
did  not  wish  to  hurt  her  feelings  and  yet  he  wanted  to  lighten 
her  task.  He  therefore  gave  orders  to  his  reapers  that  they 
must  not  be  too  careful  in  their  labours,  but  must  allow  a 
plentiful  supply  of  grain  to  remain  in  the  fields. 

All  day  long  Ruth  worked.  At  night,  when  she  made 

ready  to  carry  her  load 
home,  she  discovered  that 
she  had  gleaned  so  much 
that  she  could  hardly 
lift  it. 

She  told  Naomi  of 
what  had  happened,  how 
she  had  met  Boaz  and 
how  she  had  garnered 
more  grain  in  a  single 
morning  than  formerly  in 
a  week. 

This  made  Naomi 
very  happy.  She  felt 
that  she  could  not  live 
much  longer  and  she  now  hoped  that  Boaz  might  make  Ruth 
his  wife.  Then  she  knew  that  the  girl  would  have  a  good  home 
for  the  rest  of  her  days.  Yes,  it  was  true  that  Ruth  was  a 
foreigner.  But  her  marriage  to  a  distant  cousin  of  Boaz  had 
almost  made  her  a  member  of  the  great  Jewish  family,  and 
every  one  liked  her. 

And  so  it  happened.  First  Boaz  (as  was  his  good  right, 
according  to  another  law  of  Moses  which  had  been  made  to 
protect  the  farmer  against  the  usurer)  bought  back  the  land 
which  had  belonged  to  Elimelech,  his  cousin.  Then  he  asked 
Ruth  to  take  him  as  her  husband. 


THE  STORY  OF  RUTH 


147 


She  accepted  him  and  Naomi  went  to  live  with  her  until 
the  day  of  her  death. 

But  ere  she  closed  her  eyes,  she  had  seen  the  eldest  child 
of  Ruth,  which  was  called  Obed. 

Obed  grew  to  manhood  and  he  had  a  son  called  Jesse  and 
a  grandson  called  David.  David  became  king  of  the  Jewish 
people  and  he  was  a  direct  ancestor  of  Mary,  the  wife  of  Joseph 
the  carpenter  of  Nazareth. 

And  in  this  way  did  Jesus  descend  from  the  gentle  Ruth, 
who  had  left  her  people  that  she  might  follow  the  kindly 
impulse  of  her  heart  and  tend  the  woman  who  had  been  a 
good  mother  to  her. 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


CHAPTER  XI 

SAUL  AND  DAVID  WERE  KINGS  OF  AN  INSIGNIFICANT 
TRIBE  OF  SHEPHERDS  BUT  WHEN  SOLOMON  CAME 
TO  THE  THRONE  THE  JEWS  HAD  GAINED  GREAT 
IMPORTANCE  AS  TRADERS  AND  MERCHANTS  AND  IN 
LESS  THAN  A  SINGLE  CENTURY  THE  COUNTRY  HAD 
BEEN  CHANGED  FROM  A  LOOSE  FEDERATION  OF 
TRIBES  INTO  A  STRONG  STATE  RULED  BY  AN  ORI¬ 
ENTAL  DESPOT 


HE  Jews  had  now  been  living  for  sev¬ 
eral  centuries  in  the  mountains  and  in 
the  valleys  on  both  sides  of  the  river 
Jordan. 

After  the  interminable  wars  with 
the  original  inhabitants  of  the  land  of 
Canaan  and  with  the  neighbours  of 
east  and  west  and  south  and  north,  the 
country  had  at  last  settled  down  to  a  period  of  comparative 
peace. 

New  roads  were  being  opened  and  caravans,  carrying  mer¬ 
chandise  from  Memphis  to  Babylonia  and  from  Asia  Minor  to 
Arabia,  began  to  make  use  of  the  highways  which  ran  so  con- 

148 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


149 


veniently  through  this  western  corner  of  the  Asiatic  mainland. 

This  meant  a  slow  but  gradual  and  distinct  change  in  the 
lives  of  the  people. 

The  Jewish  people  had  always  been  fond  of  city  life.-  Even 
in  the  days  of  Moses,  they  had  preferred  the  bondage  of  the 
Egyptians  slums  to  the  liberty  of  the  isolated  farms  of  the 
Promised  Land.  With  the  utmost  difficulty  had  Moses  been 
able  to  drag  his  unwilling  relatives  away  from  the  pleasures 
and  the  safety  of  the  high-walled  towns. 

Now,  however,  the  tribes  were  their  own  master.  Moses 
was  dead  and  Joshua,  his  great  successor,  was  dead  and  the 
days  of  hardship  and  triumph  were  beginning  to  be  forgotten. 

The  life  of  the  farmer  and  of  the  shepherd  was  not 
an  easy  one.  The  hours  of  work  were  long  and  there  was 
little  opportunity  for  pleasure.  On  the  other  hand,  great 
profits  could  be  made  quite  easily  in  one  of  the  trading-posts 
along  the  busy  caravan  routes. 

It  was  difficult  to  withstand  the  temptation.  Many  people 
left  their  villages  and  returned  to  the  cities.  Soon  riches  in¬ 
creased.  But  so  did  poverty.  While  the  cause  of  national 
independence  and  personal  liberty  began  to  suffer  until  it  was 
irretrievably  lost. 

It  is  true  that  the  famous  Judges  who  had  been  in  command 
of  the  tribal  armies  during  the  wars  of  conquest  had  often  ruled 
the  country  with  the  power  of  absolute  sovereigns. 

None,  however,  had  dared  to  call  themselves  King. 

Their  subjects  would  not  have  tolerated  such  a  step. 

They  would  have  killed  the  man  who  tampered  with  their 
liberties. 

They  were  willing  to  obey  him  as  long  as  the  country  was 
in  danger.  But  when  peace  returned,  the  Judge  was  merely 
the  president  of  a  small  union  of  half-independent  tribes. 


160 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


People  respected  him  (just  as  we  respect  the  Chief  Justice 
of  the  United  States),  but  it  was  a  far  cry  from  kingship 
and  homage. 

As  soon  as  the  country  ceased  to  be  an  agricultural  com¬ 
munity  and  became  a  business  office,  all  this  began  to  change. 
The  majority  of  the  Jews  no  longer  cared  to  be  bothered  with 
affairs  of  state.  They  wanted  to  be  left  alone  that  they  might 
devote  themselves  to  their  own  affairs  and  might  tend  to  their 
farms  or  their  businesses.  Meanwhile  they  were  quite  willing 
that  a  few  professional  military  men  and  a  few  professional 
priests  should  look  after  the  physical  and  spiritual  well-being  of 
the  nation. 

Of  course,  they  hated  to  pay  taxes.  We  all  do.  But  pro¬ 
vided  that  those  taxes  were  kept  within  certain  reasonable 
bounds,  the  people  asked  no  questions  and  did  not  complain. 
As  a  result,  the  country  drifted  inevitably  towards  a  more  and 
more  centralised  form  of  government.  Finally  it  became  an 
absolute  kingdom  and  in  less  than  a  century,  it  grew  into  a 
full-fledged,  oriental  despotism,  as  we  shall  tell  you  in  this 
chapter. 

All  of  this  did  not  come  without  warning. 

In  history,  as  in  nature,  nothing  ever  happens  suddenly. 

It  often  looks  that  way. 

But  the  underlying  secret  causes  for  an  abrupt  change  have 
been  at  work  for  hundreds  of  years.  The  final  collapse  of  a 
mountain  or  the  downfall  of  an  old  institution  may  take  a  few 
minutes  or  seconds.  The  work  of  preparation,  however,  and 
of  slow  demolition  has  been  the  labour  of  many  generations. 

And  the  Jewish  nation  just  then  was  passing  through  such 
a  period  of  transition,  although  not  one  citizen  in  a  hundred 
thousand  seemed  to  understand  what  was  actually  happening. 

Perhaps  this  is  a  slight  exaggeration.  Not  aU  the  people 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


151 


were  entirely  blind  to  the  dangers  which  threatened  the  national 
soul.  A  few  men  who  could  see  things  more  sharply  than 
their  neighbours  uttered  ominous  words  of  warning. 

They  were  called  Prophets. 

As  we  shall  meet  them  upon  every  page  of  the  rest  of  our 
story,  we  ought  to  tell  you 
something  about  them. 

What  was  a  Prophet? 

It  is  hard  to  define  the  word. 

Perhaps  we  shall  do  best  by 
calling  the  Prophets  the  spir¬ 
itual  leaders  of  the  Jewish  peo¬ 
ple. 

Many  of  them  were  great 
poets.  But  they  were  more 
than  that. 

Several  of  them  had  the  gift 
of  speech.  But  they  were  some¬ 
thing  beyond  mere  orators. 

One  thing  they  all  had  in  common.  They  dared  to  stand 
up  for  the  truth  as  they  saw  it. 

A  good  many  of  them  were  very  narrow-minded  and  utterly 
intolerant  of  any  opinion  which  differed  from  their  own  view. 
But  they  had  the  courage  of  their  convictions  and  sacrificed 
everything  (including  their  own  lives)  when  it  came  to  a 
question  of  principles. 

Whenever  a  King  of  Israel  or  a  King  of  Judah  committed 
a  wrong,  there  was  a  Prophet  to  tell  him  so. 

Whenever  the  people  left  the  narrow  path  of  divine 
righteousness,  a  Prophet  stepped  forth  to  remind  them  of  the 
error  of  their  ways. 

Whenever  the  nation  was  guilty  of  a  crime,  a  Prophet  fore¬ 
told  the  coming  wrath  of  almighty  Jehovah. 


THE  PROPHET  BECAME  THE 
CONCRETE  EXPRESSION  OF 
THE  NATIONAL  CONSCIENCE 


152 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Until  the  voice  of  the  Prophets  became  the  concrete  expres¬ 
sion  of  the  national  conscience. 

Centuries  afterwards,  when  the  Jewish  state  lay  buried 
beneath  the  ruins  of  its  own  follies,  this  national  conscience,  the 
work  of  half  a  hundred  men,  remained  as  the  triumphant  heri¬ 
tage  which  the  people  of  Israel 
and  the  people  of  Judah  be¬ 
stowed  upon  all  mankind. 

In  the  coming  chapters,  we 
shall  have  to  give  an  account  of 
an  exceedingly  complicated  pe¬ 
riod  of  history. 

First  of  all,  a  union  of  semi¬ 
independent  little  wandering 
tribes  becomes  a  kingdom  under 
David. 

That  kingdom  is  immedi¬ 
ately  turned  into  an  absolute 
despotism  by  David’s  son  Solomon. 

There  is  a  rebelhon  against  this  tyranny  and  as  a  result, 
the  Jewish  state  is  divided  into  two  separate  kingdoms,  which 
hate  each  other  with  a  ferocious  hatred  and  fight  each  other 
until  they  are  both  destroyed  by  their  powerful  neighbours  of 
the  east. 

Then  follows  an  era  of  foreign  domination  and  of  exile. 

The  faithful  ones,  however,  return  to  Jerusalem  as  soon 
as  they  can  and  rebuild  the  temple. 

A  short  time  later,  the  country  is  invaded  once  again. 
Jewish  independence  comes  definitely  to  an  end,  but  the  genius 
of  the  Jewish  spirit  escapes  the  narrow  nationalistic  boundaries  • 
of  Judah  and  Israel  and  conquers  the  entire  western  world. 

In  the  coming  pages  we  shall  hear  long  lists  of  names  of 


WOE  UNTO  THE  TOWN  THAT 
LISTENED  NOT  TO  THE 
VOICE  OF  THE  PROPHET 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


153 


kings  and  queens  and  high  priests.  Rehoboam  and  Asa  and 
Jeroboam  and  Baasha  and  Menahem  and  J oash  and  Amaziah 
and  a  score  of  others,  ending  with  the  unspeakable  Herod,  suc¬ 
ceed  each  other  with  indecent  and  gory  haste. 

Their  days  upon  this  earth  were  filled  with  murder  and 
plunder.  They  promulgated  laws  which  have  been  forgotten 
and  they  built  cities  which  have  disappeared  from  the  face  of 
the  earth. 

They  entered  upon  wars  and  they  celebrated  great  vic¬ 
tories  and  they  conquered  vast  territories  (and  they  lost  them 
again)  and  the  very  names  of  their  newly  acquired  provinces 
have  been  obliterated  by  time. 

Of  all  their  glory  nothing  remains  but  a  casual  reference 
in  the  brick  library  of  a  deserted  Chaldean  palace. 

They  were  like  a  thousand  other  kings  and  the  sooner  we 
shall  forget  them,  the  better. 

Their  only  claim  to  fame  is  an  involuntary  one.  Among 
their  subjects,  they  counted  a  few  Prophets.  And  what  those 
men  spoke  and  thought  three  thousand  years  ago  stands  to-day 
as  true  and  noble  as  it  did  when  the  Chaldeans  were  at  the 
gates  of  Jerusalem  and  when  the  Assyrians  threatened 
Samaria. 

For  that  reason,  and  for  that  reason  alone,  we  should  know 
the  history  of  Israel  and  that  of  Judah. 

It  is  the  very  worldly  background  for  one  of  the  greatest 
spiritual  dramas  of  all  times. 

♦  ♦  «  m 

When  we  finished  the  last  chapter,  Samuel  was  still  the 
Judge  of  the  Jewish  people. 

He  had  warned  his  followers  that  soon  they  would  be  the 
subjects  of  a  king  who  would  take  away  their  sons  and  their 


154 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


daughters  and  their  goods  and  their  chattels  and  who  would 
use  them  for  his  own  pleasure  and  delectation. 

That,  however,  was  exactly  what  most  of  the  people  wanted 
to  happen.  They  could  see  the  glory  of  their  imaginary  em¬ 
pire.  They  did  not  think  of  the  cost. 

And  so  Samuel,  who  was  a  practical  man,  set  about  to  look 
for  a  suitable  candidate  for  the  Jewish  throne. 

He  found  him  in  the  village  of  Gibeah. 

The  name  of  the  boy  was  Saul  and  he  was  the  son  of  Kish, 
who  belonged  to  the  tribe  of  Benjamin. 

The  meeting  between  the  two  heroes  of  the  Jewish  race 
was  quite  accidental.  Kish  had  lost  a  few  of  his  cows.  They 
had  wandered  away  from  the  flock  and  could  not  be  found. 
Saul  was  told  to  bring  them  back.  He  went  from  one  village 
to  the  next,  and  everywhere  he  asked  whether  the  people  had 
seen  his  father’s  cows,  but  not  a  trace  of  them  was  discovered. 

In  his  despair,  Saul  then  went  to  Samuel  to  ask  him  for 
advice.  Samuel  looked  at  Saul  and  knew  at  once  that  this 
youngster  was  called  to  be  the  ruler  of  the  Jews. 

He  told  him  so,  and  Saul  got  frightened.  It  seemed  too 
great  an  honour  for  a  shy  young  fellow. 

When  the  time  came  for  him  to  be  anointed  and  to  be  shown 
to  his  new  subjects,  he  had  to  be  dragged  from  among  the 
donkeys  which  carried  his  father’s  luggage.  He  had  hidden 
himself  behind  the  trunks  and  would  gladly  have  escaped  if  he 
had  been  given  a  chance. 

Samuel,  however,  was  a  stern  master  and  Saul  accepted  his 
fate  and  henceforth  allowed  himself  to  be  trained  for  his  high 
oiBce. 

First  of  all,  he  was  made  commander-in-chief  of  the  army, 
and  as  such  he  fought  a  great  many  battles  against  the  inevi¬ 
table  Philistines  and  against  the  Ammonites  and  against  the 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM  155 

Amalekites  and  other  Canaanite  tribes  which  had  never  been 
fully  conquered. 

He  still  had  much  to  learn. 

The  idea  of  absolute  and  unquestioning  obedience  to  the 
will  of  Jehovah,  upon  which  Samuel  insisted  at  all  times,  was 
not  agreeable  to  a  brilliant  young  fellow  who  loved  his  own 
freedom  of  action.  Furthermore,  he  began  to  enjoy  the  many 
advantages  of  his  new  position  and  he  remembered  that  one 
passes  through  this  life  only  once. 

Often  when  the  army  was  victorious  there  was  a  great  deal 
of  booty.  Samuel  insisted  that  the  greater  part  of  this  be  given 
to  the  service  of  the  Tabernacle.  Saul  on  the  other  hand  pre¬ 
ferred  to  keep  a  little  for  himself  and  for  his  soldiers. 

In  the  end,  the  inevitable  happened.  Saul,  who  was  out  in 
the  field,  and  who  rubbed  up  against  all  sorts  and  conditions 
of  men,  became  more  and  more  worldly  in  his  views. 

While  Samuel,  who  was  very  old  and  who  sat  forever  in 
his  own  room  with  his  books  and  his  thoughts,  insisted  that 
every  one  follow  his  own  rigid  example  and  spend  all  his  waking 
hours  in  some  form  of  divine  worship. 

Saul  was  not  negligent  in  his  religious  duties,  but  he  was 
what  we  now  call  a  little  too  “practical.” 

After  he  beat  Agag,  the  King  of  the  Amalekit^,  he  decided 
that  the  army  needed  a  suitable  reward.  And  so  he  quietly 
kept  the  herds  which  had  belonged  to  the  king  and  did  not  sur¬ 
render  them  to  the  priests,  as  he  ought  to  have  done.  And  to 
make  matters  worse,  he  spared  the  life  of  Agag,  whereas,  ac¬ 
cording  to  the  Jewish  law  of  that  time,  he  ought  to  have  killed 
all  his  captives. 

When  Samuel  heard  of  this,  he  scolded  Saul  for  his  disobe¬ 
dience  to  the  will  of  J ehovah. 


156 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Saul  did  not  confess  his  crime,  but  tried  to  excuse  himself. 

He  said  that  the  cows  and  the  oxen  and  the  sheep  had  been 
kept  back  that  they  might  be  fattened  before  they  were  finally 
slaughtered  and  sacrificed. 

Samuel  knew  that  he  had  intended  to  do  nothing  of  the 
sort  and  he  told  him  so.  He  accused  Saul  of  double  dealing 
and  of  dishonesty  and  warned  him  against  the  consequences  of 
such  deplorable  conduct,  which  made  him  unfiit  to  be  King 
of  the  Jewish  people. 

Saul  did  not  argue  the  point. 

He  returned  to  his  home  in  Gibeah. 

But  he  felt  dreadfully  hurt  and  he  soon  showed  his  anger. 

It  was  commonly  said  and  eagerly  believed  that  Samuel 
could  predict  the  future  and  was  a  fortune-teller  and  sooth¬ 
sayer  of  no  mean  ability. 

Saul  of  course  knew  this  too  and  he  gave  orders  that  within 
his  realm  all  fortune-tellers  should  be  either  killed  or  should 
be  forced  into  exile. 

Samuel  from  his  side  did  not  remain  idle. 

He  was  angry  and  he  intended  to  keep  his  threat.  He 
began  to  look  for  a  more  suitable  occupant  of  the  throne.  This 
time  he  meant  to  find  a  candidate  who  was  willing  to  listen  to 
the  wise  council  of  an  old  man,  who  would  be  less  independent 
in  his  actions  than  Saul  had  been. 

He  asked  for  information  about  different  young  people 
and  some  one  spoke  to  him  about  a  certain  David,  who  was 
the  son  of  Jesse  of  Bethlehem,  and  a  grandson  of  Ruth  and 
Boaz. 

The  boy  was  a  shepherd  and  he  had  quite  a  reputation 
among  the  people  of  his  own  village  for  his  courage. 

On  one  occasion  his  sheep  had  been  attacked  by  a  lion  and 
another  time,  they  had  been  attacked  by  a  bear,  and  in  both 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


157 


cases  David  had  killed  the  brute  and  had  saved  his  flocks  with¬ 
out  calling  for  help. 

Furthermore,  David  was  an  excellent  musician.  Not  only 
could  he  sing,  but  he  also  had  taught  himself  to  play  the  harp 
and  during  the  long  and  lonely  hours  when  he  followed  his 
sheep  he  used  to  make  up  bits  of  verse  which  he  sang  afterwards 
to  melodies  which  he  had  composed  himself.  He  was  quite 
famous  for  his  “Psalms”  (as  those  songs  were  called)  and 
people  came  from  far  and  wide  to  hear  him. 

When  it  became  known  that  David  enjoyed  the  particular 
favour  of  Samuel,  and  was  destined  by  him  for  a  great  future, 
it  was  everywhere  said  that  it  was  a  most  excellent  choice  and 
would  bring  happiness  to  the  whole  nation. 

Only  one  man  did  not  share  this  general  enthusiasm  about 
the  young  harpist. 

That  was  Saul. 

His  conscience  bothered  him. 

He  knew  that  Samuel  had  been  right  when  he  accused  him 
of  having  kept  the  flocks  of  Agag  against  the  express  command 
of  Jehovah. 

He  now  lived  in  constant  fear  of  David  and  wished  that 
he  could  get  rid  of  his  unpleasant  rival. 

But  what  could  he  do?  The  Jewish  people  were  watching 
the  two  men  very  carefully  and  Saul  had  to  be  very  careful  in 
whatever  he  did. 

Fortunately,  a  new  war  came  to  his  assistance.  The  Philis¬ 
tines  were  coming  back.  They  had  reorganised  their  armies 
and  now  threatened  the  eastern  valleys  of  Saul’s  domain. 

They  were  led  by  a  giant  who  was  called  Goliath.  He  was 
as  big  as  a  house  and  he  wore  an  enormous  coat  of  mail,  the 
like  of  which  had  never  been  seen  by  the  Jews. 

Every  morning  and  every  night,  he  strutted  around  between 


158 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


the  lines  of  the  Jews  and  those  of  the  Philistines  and  dared  his 
enemies  to  leave  their  trenches  and  fight  him. 

He  carried  a  sword  that  was  seven  feet  long  and  he  waved 
it  ferociously  and  he  called  the  J ews  cowards  and  all  sorts  of 
horrible  names  and  he  jeered  at  them  and  generally  made  him¬ 
self  most  detestable. 

This  went  on  day  after  day  and  week  after  week  and  noth¬ 
ing  happened.  The  soldiers,  ashamed  of  their  own  fear,  looked 
for  some  one  whom  they  could  hold  responsible  for  this  humil¬ 
iating  situation. 

Saul  as  commander-in-chief,  became  their  scapegoat. 

Why  did  he  not  go  forth  himself  and  fight  a  duel  with  the 
big  Philistine? 

For  the  simple  reason  that  he  was  ill.  He  suffered  from  a 
terrible  mood  of  depression  which  soon  began  to  affect  his 
mind.  He  sat  in  his  tent  and  brooded  and  brooded  and 
brooded,  day  after  day  and  week  after  week.  Finally  his 
generals  began  to  worry. 

It  seemed  that  Saul  was  losing  his  reason.  He  spoke  to  no 
one  and  hardly  answered  when  he  was  asked  a  question.  Some¬ 
thing  had  to  be  done  and  it  had  to  be  done  at  once. 

The  wonderful  curative  power  of  music  was  known  to  the 
ancients.  It  was  suggested  that  Saul  be  distracted  by  the 
pleasant  songs  of  David.  This  seemed  an  excellent  idea  and 
David  was  sent  for.  The  boy  came  and  played  so  well  that 
Saul  wept  bitter  tears  and  for  a  short  while  forgot  some  of  his 
troubles,  and  said  that  he  felt  much  better. 

But  even  then  he  did  not  stir  from  his  tent  and  the  army 
remained  inactive  and  Goliath  continued  to  abuse  the  Jews, 
and  every  day  at  a  certain  hour  the  Philistines  left  their  forti¬ 
fications  and  stood  about  and  laughed  until  their  sides  ached. 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


159 


This  might  have  gone  on  indefinitely,  when  David  happened 
to  return  to  the  Jewish  camp. 

He  was  one  of  a  family  of  eight,  and  three  of  his  brothers 
were  in  the  army. 

The  Jewish  soldiers  were  supposed  to  be  their  own  cooks 
and  quartermasters,  and  the  sons  of  Jesse  had  sent  word  to 
their  father  that  they  needed  fresh  supplies.  Jesse  had  ordered 
David  to  take  a  sack  of  corn  and  carry  it  to  the  front.  When 
David  with  his  burden  reached  the  camp,  he  heard  every  one 
talking  about  the  terrible  giant,  who  quite  alone  seemed  to 
hold  an  entire  army  at  bay. 

David  did  not  quite  understand  such  a  feeling  of  panic 
before  the  name  of  a  mortal  man.  Like  most  people  who  lead 
a  solitary  life  he  had  thought  a  great  deal  upon  religious  sub¬ 
jects.  He  had  an  implicit  faith  in  the  power  of  Jehovah. 
Nothing  could  happen  to  the  righteous  man  who  was  assured 
of  the  support  of  the  great  Jewish  God. 

He  volunteered  to  go  forth  by  himself  and  to  kill  this  enemy 
of  his  people  without  the  help  of  a  single  soldier. 

The  men  of  the  army  told  him  that  he  was  both  reckless 
and  foolish,  but  David  insisted.  When  his  comrades  saw  that 
he  meant  to  do  what  he  said,  they  tried  to  prepare  him  for  the 
combat.  From  the  King  down,  they  offered  him  their  armour. 

But  David  answered  “No.”  He  did  not  need  swords  and 
spears  and  shields. 

He  needed  the  moral  support  of  Jehovah.  That  was  all. 

He  went  to  the  banks  of  the  river  and  he  picked  up  a  hand¬ 
ful  of  shining,  round  pebbles.  Then  he  took  his  sling  and  left 
the  trench. 

When  the  Philistines  saw  that  a  mere  child  was  going  to 
fight  a  man  twice  his  size,  they  called  for  their  hero  and  bade 


160 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


him  make  an  example  of  the  boy.  Goliath  needed  no  urging. 
Swinging  his  terrible  sword,  he  rushed  at  David. 

But  a  small  pebble  from  David’s  sling  hit  him  right  in  the 
eye.  Stunned  by  the  blow,  Goliath  stumbled  and  fell  and 
dropped  his  weapon. 

Quick  as  lightning,  David  was  upon  him. 


He  grabbed  the  giant’s  sword. 

He  hacked  at  him  with  unexpected  violence. 

With  a  single  blow  he  cut  off  the  monstrous  head. 

He  picked  it  up  and  carried  it  back  to  the  jubilant  soldiers. 

The  Philistines  fled  and  David  was  hailed  as  the  Saviour 
of  the  Country. 

After  such  an  exploit,  even  Saul  was  forced  to  take  some 
public  notice  of  the  national  hero.  He  asked  David  to  come 
and  visit  him,  but  he  never  could  overcome  his  old  suspicion. 
His  dislike  grew  into  open  hatred  when  he  noticed  the  friend- 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


161 


ship  which  sprang  up  between  his  son  J onathan  and  the  shep¬ 
herd  from  Bethlehem  as  soon  as  the  two  had  met. 

To  make  matters  worse,  his  daughter  Michal  fell  in  love 
with  the  handsome  red-haired  David.  Saul  told  David  that 
he  might  marry  her  if  he  first  destroyed  a  hundred  Philistines. 
A  hundred,  of  course,  was  a  very  large  number  and  Saul  no 
doubt  counted  upon  David  being  killed  before  he  had  accom¬ 
plished  his  task. 

But  David  was  successful  in  this  as  in  all  other  things  and 
so  he  married  Michal  and  the  two  rival  kings  were  now  in 
the  relation  of  father-in-law  and  son-in-law. 

It  is  no  wonder  that  Saul’s  old  fits  of  melancholia  returned 
worse  than  before  and  when  his  doctors  were  at  their  wits’  end, 
they  once  more  suggested  a  concert.  This  time,  however,  the 
performance  was  almost  fatal  to  the  unfortunate  harpist. 

As  soon  as  he  had  struck  a  few  chords,  Saul  fell  into  a  vio¬ 
lent  rage. 

He  took  his  spear  and  he  threw  it  at  David.  David  saved 
himself  by  jumping  out  of  the  room.  He  did  not  care  to  meet 
the  King  again.  He  left  the  royal  tents  and  ran  away. 

Then  Saul’s  wrath  turned  against  Jonathan  and  he  tried 
to  kill  his  own  son.  But  his  followers  held  his  hands  and  pre¬ 
vented  the  murder.  Jonathan  felt  terribly  upset  by  what  had 
just  happened  and  felt  that  he  ought  to  speak  to  David  and 
explain  things.  When  they  met  for  the  last  time,*  the  two 
friends  bade  each  other  an  affectionate  farewell  and  David  fled 
into  the  desert,  where  he  established  himself  in  a  cave,  called 
AduUam. 

Soon,  however,  the  soldiers  of  Saul  discovered  where  he  was 
hiding  himself.  But  David  had  been  warned  and  had  escaped 
further  into  the  wilderness.  The  cave  was  empty.  The  victim 
was  gone. 


162 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Life  in  the  desert  was  very  dull  and  to  while  away  the 
tedious  hours  of  the  endless  day,  David  wrote  several  more 
poems.  A  few  of  these  you  will  find  in  a  special  chapter  of  the 
Old  Testament,  called  the  Psalms.  I  shall  not  print  them  in  my 
story.  Centuries  ago  they  were  translated  into  such  perfect 
English  that  it  would  be  very  foolish  for  me  to  try  to  repeat 
them  in  my  own  words.  Besides,  I  am  only  trying  to  give  an 
account  of  the  adventures  of  the  Jewish  people  and  the  Psalms 
have  very  little  to  do  with  actual  history.  But  they  are  a  mag¬ 
nificent  expression  of  the  old  poetic  spirit  of  the  Jewish  race 
and  they  contain  more  beauty  and  more  wisdom  than  many  of 
the  purely  historical  books  of  the  Old  Testament  which  are 
devoted  to  the  endless  recital  of  foreign  war  and  domestic  up¬ 
heaval. 

But  to  return  to  David.  He  now  passed  through  the 
strangest  adventures  of  his  long  and  very  checkered  career.  He 
was  in  a  very  difficult  and  awkward  position.  Theoretically, 
he  was  the  King  of  the  Jews,  for  Samuel  had  deposed  Saul  after 
his  disobedience  in  the  Agag  campaign  and  had  thereupon 
anointed  David  as  his  successor. 

The  mass  of  the  people,  however,  had  not  been  able  to 
follow  such  a  rapid  political  change.  They  still  vaguely  recog¬ 
nised  Saul  as  their  King  and  if  the  word  were  not  a  little  too 
colloquial,  we  would  say  that  they  regarded  David  as  a  sort 
of  official  understudy,  a  crown-prince,  who  at  any  moment 
might  be  called  upon  to  act  as  regent. 

Unfortunately  in  those  days  (as  now)  possession  was  nine 
points  of  the  law. 

Saul,  whatever  his  actual  status,  continued  to  live  in  the 
royal  tents.  He  was  surrounded  by  his  body-guards  and  by 
his  attendants  and  he  was  the  commander  of  a  full-fledged 
army,  ready  to  do  his  bidding. 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


163 


David,  on  the  other  hand,  was  no  better  than  a  fugitive 
before  the  law.  He  lived  in  a  cave  in  the  wilderness  and  he 
could  not  show  himself  in  any  of  the  nearby  cities  or  villages 
without  running  the  risk  of  being  arrested. 

Afterwards,  when  he  himself  was  the  undisputed  ruler  of 
the  Jewish  people,  this  period  of  David’s  exile  needed  a  good 
deal  of  explaining.  At  times,  our  hero  seems  to  have  been 
little  better  than  the  leader  of  a  band  of  brigands.  Finally, 
he  even  went  so  far  as  to  take  service  with  the  Philistines. 

But  we  must  not  judge  him  too  severely.  David  had  been 
treated  most  unfairly  by  Saul.  It  was  greatly  to  his  credit  that 
he  continued  to  treat  his  enemy  with  the  utmost  courtesy  and 
generosity. 

Saul,  judging  him  by  our  modern  standards,  was  going 
stark  mad.  In  restless  haste,  he  was  forever  travelling  from 
one  part  of  the  country  to  another. 

One  day,  on  his  trip  through  the  desert,  he  was  overtaken 
by  darkness  and  went  into  a  cave  to  spend  the  night.  It  hap¬ 
pened  to  be  the  same  cave  in  which  David  had  made  his  home 
after  his  flight  from  the  residence.  David  saw  his  unwelcome 
guest  as  he  entered,  but  he  hid  himself  and  waited. 

In  the  middle  of  the  night,  he  crept  toward  the  sleeping 
man  and  cut  off  a  piece  of  his  coat.  The  next  morning  when 
Saul  departed,  David  ran  after  him  and  called  him  by  name 
and  showed  him  the  piece  of  cloth. 

‘‘Look  at  this,”  he  said,  “and  think  what  I  might  have  done 
to  you,  and  what  I  have  not  done.  You  were  in  my  power.  I 
might  have  killed  you  quite  easily.  And  yet  I  spared  you, 
although  you  continue  to  persecute  me.” 

Saul  of  course  could  not  fail  to  see  that  David  was  right. 
But  he  hated  this  one  particular  person  with  the  unreasoning 
resentment  of  a  madman,  and  although  he  mumbled  an  apology 


164  THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

and  called  his  soldiers  back,  he  did  not  ask  David  to  return 
to  his  Court. 

A  short  while  afterward,  Samuel  died. 

At  the  funeral,  David  and  Saul  met,  but  the  two  men  were 
not  reconciled. 

And  so  things  continued  for  a  long  time. 


SAUL  ENTERS  THE  CAVE  OF  DAVID 


Then  it  happened  during  one  of  Saul’s  endless  peregrina¬ 
tions  that  he  found  himself  for  a  second  time  at  the  mercy  of 
his  hated  rival. 

Saul,  to  the  end  of  his  days,  remained  at  heart  a  simple 
Jewish  farmer.  He  hated  cities  and  refused  to  live  in  a  house. 
Whenever  he  could,  he  spent  his  days  in  the  desert.  Once 
more  he  left  his  village  to  enjoy  the  peace  and  quiet  of  the 
wilderness.  During  the  afternoon  when  it  was  very  hot  he 
had  fallen  asleep  underneath  a  high  rock,  which  was  often 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


165 


used  by  David  when  he  wanted  to  listen  to  the  voice  of  the 
sun  and  the  wind,  that  they  might  tell  him  those  strange  secrets 
which  afterwards  he  repeated  in  his  songs. 

Abner,  a  cousin  of  Saul  and  commander-in-chief  of  his 
armies,  slept  by  his  master’s  side. 

David  had  seen  the  two  men  when  they  approached.  Noise¬ 
lessly  he  climbed  down  the  steep  path  which  led  to  the  foot  of 
the  rock.  He  took  Abner’s  sword  and  spear,  and  returned 
whence  he  had  come. 

Then  he  shouted:  “Oh,  Abner!  Abner!” 

When  the  soldier  awoke,  David  upbraided  him  for  his  neg¬ 
lect  of  duty.  The  man  who  was  called  upon  to  protect  the 
King  allowed  a  casual  stranger  to  steal  his  arms.  He  was  a 
faithful  servant  indeed!  And  more  words  to  that  effect. 

Even  Saul,  in  the  tortured  agony  of  his  stricken  soul,  was 
forced  to  recognise  the  generosity  of  David’s  heart.  For  a 
second  time,  David  had  spared  his  life.  He  now  told  David 
that  he  was  sorry  for  the  cruel  way  in  which  he  had  treated 
him  and  asked  him  to  come  back. 

And  so  David  gathered  up  his  few  belongings  and  returned 
to  the  court,  but  not  for  long. 

Saul  was  steadily  growing  worse.  After  a  few  weeks, 
everything  was  as  it  had  been  before  and  it  was  no  longer  safe 
for  David  to  be  seen  around  the  royal  buildings. 

Of  course,  he  could  have  insisted  upon  his  rights  as  the 
only  truly  anointed  ruler  of  the  Jews.  But  he  knew  that 
the  days  of  Saul  were  numbered  and  he  did  not  force  the  issue. 

He  went  away  and  never  saw  his  old  enemy  again. 

After  a  while  he  settled  down  in  the  village  of  Ziklag.  It 
belonged  to  Achish,  the  King  of  Gath,  and  was  situated  on 
the  border. 

Here  David’s  position  was  far  from  pleasant. 


166 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


He  had  a  way  of  attracting  men.  He  was  forever  sur¬ 
rounded  by  adventurous  young  fellows  who  hoped  to  make 
their  fortune  as  his  soldiers  and  servants. 

It  had  been  that  way  in  the  wilderness  where  David  at  one 
time  had  commanded  no  less  than  four  hundred  volunteers. 
It  does  not  sound  like  a  very  large  number  to  us,  because  we 
are  accustomed  to  armies  of  milhons,  but  in  the  eleventh  cen¬ 
tury  before  our  era,  four  hundred  men  were  a  formidable  army, 
and  David  had  been  the  undisputed  ruler  of  almost  an  entire 
province  and  many  stories  of  his  strange  exploits  have  survived 
until  this  day. 

David  seems  to  have  hired  himself  out  to  the  farmers  of 
that  neighbourhood  as  a  sort  of  private  policeman  to  protect 
them  against  robbers.  At  least,  we  know  of  one  occasion  when 
a  certain  Nabal,  the  Sheik  of  Carmel,  had  refused  to  pay  him 
for  his  services.  David,  according  to  the  story,  was  so  angry 
at  this  injustice  that  he  gathered  all  his  men  and  was  about  to 
kill  the  entire  Nabal  tribe,  when  Abigail,  the  wife  of  Nabal, 
rushed  forth  to  meet  him  and  appeased  the  wrath  of  the  great 
Philistine  fighter  with  presents  and  fine  promises. 

Incidentally,  when  Abigail  returned  home,  she  found  that 
her  husband  was  in  such  a  state  of  drunkenness  that  he  could 
not  be  told  of  the  events  of  that  afternoon.  The  next  morning, 
when  he  was  told  of  the  danger  which  he  had  just  escaped,  he 
had  a  fit,  of  which  he  died  ten  days  later. 

This  left  Abigail  a  widow.  During  her  short  interview,  she 
made  a  deep  impression  upon  David.  When  he  heard  of  her 
husband’s  death,  he  asked  her  to  become  his  wife,  and  she 
accepted. 

He  had  apparently  grown  tired  of  Michal  ( Saul’s  daugh¬ 
ter)  for  he  gave  her  to  a  friend  who  lived  in  the  village  of 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


167 


Gallim,  and  then  he  married  Abigail  and  took  her  to  Hebron, 
and  there  a  son  was  born  to  them  who  was  called  Chileah. 

This  new  marriage,  however,  did  not  in  any  way  settle 
David’s  other  difficulties.  He  still  had  a  faithful  band  of  fol¬ 
lowers,  but  there  was  no  police  work  to  he  done  and  it  was 
hard  to  make  both  ends  meet.  And  finally,  the  same  man  who 
a  few  years  before  had  been  the  scourge  of  the  Philistines  was 
almost  forced  to  enter  their  service. 

It  happened  this  way.  King  Achish,  his  host,  informed 
him  suddenly  that  the  Philistines  were  going  to  make  war  upon 
the  Jews.  He,  Achish,  was  hound  by  treaty  to  offer  his  help 
and  as  David  enjoyed  his  hospitality,  he  expected  him  (David) 
to  take  part  in  the  campaign  on  the  side  of  his  country’s 
enemies. 

David  was  at  his  wit’s  end.  He  gave  an  ambiguous  answer, 
and  sparred  for  time.  As  nothing  happened,  he  finally  marched 
to  the  Philistine  camp.  The  Philistine  commander,  however, 
had  wisely  decided  that  help  from  such  a  source  would  be  of 
very  doubtful  quality.  He  quietly  allowed  David  to  return 
to  Ziklag  and  did  not  bother  him. 

When  he  got  back  he  found  that  during  his  absence  the 
village  had  been  plundered  by  the  Amalekites.  He  followed 
the  robbers,  attacked  them,  defeated  them,  killed  them  all  (with 
the  exception  of  four  hundred)  and  once  more  returned  to  the 
peaceful  ways  of  a  Simeonite  village. 

The  Philistine  campaign  took  place  as  it  had  been  planned. 

"jit  had  a  very  unexpected  result.  When  Saul  was  told  of 
the  approaching  danger  of  a  new  invasion,  he  fell  into  an 
abysmal  gloom. 

^  He  felt  that  the  end  of  all  things  had  come. 

He  was  so  desperate  about  the  future  of  himself  and  his 
family,  that  he  decided  to  consult  a  sorcerer.  But  all  the 


168 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


magicians  either  were  dead  or  had  left  the  country.  They 
had  been  driven  away  from  the  country  by  Saul’s  own  edict. 

At  last,  however,  the  King  was  told  that  there  was  an  old 
witch  who  lived  in  Endor,  the  village  near  which  Sisera  had 
been  murdered  by  Jael. 

In  the  middle  of  the  night  (for  he  felt  ashamed  of  what 
he  was  doing)  Saul  went  to  see  the  witch.  The  woman,  how¬ 
ever,  was  afraid  to  receive  him.  She  knew  the  terrible  punish¬ 
ment  for  sorcery  and  refused  to  open  her  door  to  the  King. 

Saul  reassured  her. 

He  promised  her  that  she  would  he  richly  rewarded  if  she 
made  it  possible  for  him  to  speak  to  the  soul  of  one  who  had 
been  dead  for  several  years. 

The  witch  asked  him  what  he  meant. 

Saul  answered  that  he  wanted  to  speak  to  his  old  master 
Samuel 

Then  out  of  the  ground  there  arose  the  dark  figure  of  an 
old  man,  wrapped  in  a  long  black  cloak. 

It  was  the  ghost  of  Samuel. 

Once  more  Saul,  the  living  King,  and  Samuel,  the  dead 
Judge,  were  face  to  face  and  there  Samuel  told  Saul  of  the 
terrible  fate  which  awaited  him  at  the  hands  of  the  Philistines. 

When  Samuel  ceased  to  speak,  Saul  had  fainted. 

But  he  had  a  brave  soul,  this  old  frontiersman. 

Early  the  next  day,  he  attacked  the  Philistines. 

Before  noon  his  army  had  been  annihilated.  His  sons, 
Jonathan  and  Malchishua  and  Abinadab,  had  all  been  killed 
and  Saul  himself  lay  dead  with  his  own  sword  through  his 
heart.  He  had  remembered  the  fate  of  Samson  and  he  had 
killed  himself  rather  than  fall  into  the  hands  of  his  enemies. 

His  body  was  found  by  the  Philistines. 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


169 


They  cut  off  the  head  and  sent  it  throughout  the  land  that 
it  might  carry  the  glad  tidings  of  victory  to  all  the  people. 

They  took  the  shield  and  the  spear  and  the  armour  and 
placed  these  in  the  heathenish  temple  of  Ashtaroth  among  the 
other  trophies  of  their  endless  wars. 

They  then  fastened  the  headless  corpse  of  Saul  and  those 
of  the  three  royal  princes  to  the  walls  of  Beth-shean. 

When  the  people  of  Jabesh-gilead  heard  of  this,  they  de¬ 
cided  to  rescue  the  remains  of  the  man  who  had  once  saved  their 
city  from  siege.  In  the  dark  of  night  they  stole  into  Beth- 
shean  and  they  took  the  bones  of  their  royal  master  and  his 
three  sons  and  they  buried  them  secretly  underneath  the  sacred 
tamarisk  tree  of  their  own  village. 

The  news  of  this  terrible  national  tragedy  reached  David  in 
a  curious  way.  One  of  the  Philistines,  hoping  to  gain  favour 
in  the  eyes  of  the  new  Jewish  King,  rode  at  great  speed  to  the 
village  of  Ziklag  and  informed  David  that  Saul  was  dead. 

He  also  explained  how  it  happened  that  Saul  had  been  slain 
together  with  so  many  of  his  sons. 

‘T  came  upon  them  suddenly  near  the  mountain  called  Gil- 
boa,”  he  lied,  “and  I  killed  them  all  because  I  knew  that  they 
were  your  enemies.” 

He  did  not  receive  the  reward  which  he  had  expected. 

David  ordered  that  he  be  hanged  and  when  this  had  been 
done,  he  went  into  deep  mourning  for  his  former  master  and 
for  his  dearly  beloved  friend,  Jonathan. 

As  usual,  he  found  sure  relief  in  music  and  in  poetry  and 
he  composed  that  noble  song  which  begins:  “The  beauty  of 
Israel  is  slain.  How  are  the  mighty  fallen,”  which  you  will 
find  in  the  first  chapter  of  the  second  Book  of  Samuel. 

Then  he  fasted  for  a  long  time  and  when  he  had  expressed 
his  sense  of  mourning  in  such  a  way  that  all  the  people  should 


170 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


know  the  deep  sincerity  of  his  grief,  he  made  ready  to  claim 
his  kingdom. 

He  asked  Jehovah  whither  he  should  go  at  first  and 
Jehovah  told  him  to  travel  to  Mount  Hebron. 

There  all  the  men  of  the  tribe  of  Judah  met  their  new 

sovereign  and  David  was  offi¬ 
cially  anointed  as  the  successor 
of  Saul. 

For  almost  forty  years 
David  was  king  of  the  greater 
part  of  the  Jewish  lands. 

He  was  a  man  of  great  ex¬ 
ecutive  ability.  Otherwise  he 
would  have  failed  in  a  task 
which  was  well-nigh  hopeless. 

In  the  first  place,  there  were 
the  Philistines.  Centuries  of 
war  had  not  enabled  the  Jews 
to  shake  off  this  constant  menace.  Time  and  again  we  read 
that  the  power  of  the  Philistines  had  been  broken  for  good. 
But  a  few  years  later,  there  would  be  fresh  trouble,  and  until 
the  end  of  their  national  independence,  the  Jews  were  forced 
to  pay  an  annual  tribute  to  the  much-hated  neighbours,  whose 
superior  skill  in  war  made  them  invincible  whenever  the  armies 
met  in  pitched  battle. 

In  the  second  place  (and  this  was  almost  worse)  David  had 
to  contend  with  interminable  quarrels  among  the  Jewish  tribes 
themselves.  The  different  clans  were  as  jealous  of  each  other 
as  only  the  people  of  small  villages  can  be. 

They  wanted  a  King. 

But  just  as  soon  as  they  had  a  King  they  began  to  resent 
his  power. 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


171 


And  even  David,  with  his  tremendous  prestige,  was  not 
strong  enough  to  overcome  prejudice  and  assert  himself  when 
he  was  called  upon  to  punish  a  popular  soldier  who  had  broken 
the  law. 

For  example,  when  Joab,  his  own  nephew,  who  held  a  high 
position  in  the  army,  murdered  Abner,  the  faithful  servant  of 
Saul,  David  did  not  dare  to 
execute  Joab.  He  gave  Ab¬ 
ner  a  magnificent  funeral,  but 
that  was  all. 

Joab  was  never  brought  to 
trial  and  David  was  to  regret 
the  day  that  he  had  spared  his 
life. 

Very  slowly  and  only  by 
using  all  his  intelligence  and 
all  the  strength  of  his  indom¬ 
itable  will,  he  made  himself 
the  absolute  master  of  the 
land. 

A  short  time  later,  when 
the  servants  of  one  of  Saul’s 
remaining  sons  killed  their 
master,  David  was  ready  for 
them.  He  hanged  the  mur¬ 
derers  and  announced  that  a 
similar  fate  awaited  all  those  who  were  going  to  take  the  law 
into  their  own  hands. 

This  at  last  put  the  fear  of  Jehovah  into  the  hearts  of  the 
Jews,  and  then  David  took  a  further  step  which  was  to  be  of 
great  benefit  to  the  new  kingdom. 

He  moved  the  capital  of  the  country  to  the  city  of  Jeru- 


172 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Salem,  which  was  conveniently  situated  upon  the  highroads 
from  Africa  to  Mesopotamia. 

There  he  built  himself  a  palace. 

When  that  was  done,  he  began  to  talk  of  plans  for  a  Temple 
which  was  to  replace  the  Tabernacle. 

Ever  since  that  memorable  day  when  the  driverless  cows 
had  brought  the  Ark  back  from  the  land  of  the  Philistines, 
the  Holy  Shrine  had  stood  in  the  house  of  Abinadab  in  the 
village  of  Kirjath-jearim.  It  was  time  that  it  be  given  a  suit¬ 
able  resting  place  in  the  new  capital.  The  Tabernacle  had  been 
good  enough  for  wanderers  in  the  desert,  but  a  powerful  state 
like  that  of  the  Jews  could  afford  a  real  Temple  and  the  people 
felt  that  the  building  of  such  an  edifice  had  become  a  national 
duty. 

As  a  preliminary,  it  was  decided  to  bring  the  Ark  to  Jeru¬ 
salem. 

David,  therefore,  with  an  entire  army-corps,  went  east  to 
get  the  Ark.  The  priests  loaded  it  upon  a  cart  and  one  of  the 
sons  of  Abinadab,  by  the  name  of  Uzzah,  took  hold  of  the 
reins. 

But  the  cart  got  into  a  rut,  one  of  the  oxen  stumbled,  and 
the  Ark  was  almost  upset.  Uzzah,  quite  unconsciously, 
stretched  out  his  hand  to  steady  the  shrine  and  keep  it  from 
falling. 

At  once  he  was  struck  dead. 

According  to  old  Jewish  law,  no  layman  had  the  right  to 
touch  the  Ark.  That  was  ^the  exclusive  business  of  the  priests. 

The  happy  procession,  with  David  at  its  head,  came  to  a 
sudden  halt. 

Uzzah  was  buried,  and  the  Ark  was  carried  into  the  house 
of  a  Gittite  by  the  name  of  Obed-edom. 

There  it  stood  for  three  months. 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


173 


Then  David  returned  with  all  his  soldiers.  Once  more  the 
Ark  was  hoisted  upon  a  wagon. 

This  time  it  safely  reached  Jerusalem  and  it  was  placed  in 
a  new  Tabernacle  which  Solomon,  the  successor  of  David,  was 
afterwards  to  change  into  the  well-known  Temple. 

From  that  moment  on,  Jerusalem  was  not  only  the  capital 
of  the  Jewish  states  but  it  also  became  the  religious  centre  for 
all  those  who  claimed  descent  from  Abraham.  There  were 
other  holy  places  in  Palestine,  but  these  were  all  surpassed  by 
the  splendours  of  the  house  of  offering  of  Jerusalem. 

Furthermore,  the  Levite  families,  who  had  a  monopoly 
of  the  Jewish  priest-craft  were  clever  men.  They  tolerated 
no  rivals  and  they  were  staunch  supporters  of  the  King.  He  in 
turn  showed  his  favour  by  ordering  that  all  the  other  shrines 
in  the  land  be  closed  and  by  forcing  the  worshippers  to  come 
to  his  own  capital. 

When  the  religious  side  of  life  had  been  attended  to,  David 
turned  his  mind  to  affairs  of  a  military  nature. 

First  he  rounded  out  the  frontiers  of  his  kingdom. 

Next  he  defeated  the  Ammonites  in  such  a  decisive  way 
that  they  ceased  to  trouble  the  Jews. 

In  the  third  place,  he  made  a  truce  with  the  Philistines, 
who  thereafter  left  him  in  peace. 

From  a  worldly  point  of  view,  the  kingdom  of  David  was  a 
great  success. 

But  all  was  not  well  with  the  man  who  stood  at  the  head 
of  the  nation. 

The  unlimited  power  of  his  exalted  position  was  beginning 
to  spoil  him. 

Like  Samuel,  David  was  in  many  respects  a  very  weak 
man.  He  was  kindly  and  wise  and  very  good-natured,  even 
to  his  enemies.  He  had  been  very  generous  to  the  only  living 


174 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


grandson  of  Saul,  who  happened  to  he  the  son  of  his  bosom 
friend,  Jonathan. 

This  poor  boy,  who  was  lame  in  both  feet,  was  adopted  by 
David  as  his  own  child,  and  until  the  day  of  his  death,  lived  with 
him  in  the  palace  of  Jerusalem. 

But  when  his  own  pleasure  was  involved,  David  could  be  as 
mean  and  cruel  as  the  worst  of  his  subjects. 

One  evening,  while  taking  the  air  on  the  roof  of  his  palace 
(as  was  the  custom  of  the  Jewish  people  during  summer  when 
the  weather  was  hot)  David  saw  in  the  distance  a  woman. 

He  liked  her  looks,  and  he  said  that  he  wanted  her  for  his 
wife. 

But  when  he  made  inquiries  about  her,  he  discovered  that 
she  was  already  married  to  a  Hittite  by  the  name  of  Uriah, 
who  was  an  officer  then  serving  at  the  front  under  Joab,  the 
same  general  who  (as  you  will  remember)  had  never  been 
punished  for  the  murder  of  Abner. 

Of  course,  David  ought  to  have  forgotten  the  woman  at 
once,  but  he  did  nothing  of  the  sort. 

Instead,  he  invited  her  husband  to  his  palace. 

He  treated  him  most  kindly  and  gave  him  presents  and 
then  he  sent  him  back  to  the  army  with  a  letter  to  Joab  in  which 
he  told  Joab  to  place  Uriah  in  the  front  line  and  to  leave  him 
there,  that  he  might  be  killed  by  the  enemy. 

Joab,  who  was  no  better  than  a  common  criminal,  was  just 
the  sort  of  man  to  arrange  such  a  cold-blooded  murder.  He 
did  not  warn  Uriah  of  his  danger.  On  the  contrary,  he  flat¬ 
tered  the  poor  fellow  and  told  him  that  he  was  to  be  entrusted 
with  a  place  in  the  line  of  danger  in  recognition  of  his  bravery. 
Uriah  believed  all  this  and  cheerfully  assumed  command  of 
the  vanguard. 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


175 


When  the  attack  was  made,  the  plan  of  David  was  carried 
out  with  scrupulous  regard  to  detail. 

Uriah  rushed  forward. 

At  a  word  of  command  by  Joab,  the  other  soldiers  retreated. 

Uriah  was  left  alone  and  he  was  killed. 

This  made  his  wife,  Bathsheba,  a  widow,  and  soon  after¬ 
wards,  David  married  her. 

David,  however,  was  mistaken  when  he  thought  that  his 
evil  deed  had  not  become  known  to  the  people  of  Jerusalem. 

The  soldiers  at  the  front  (who  always  know  a  good  many 
things)  had  told  their  relatives.  News  travels  fast  in  a  small 
country  and  soon  all  the  Jews  knew  how  their  King,  desiring 
the  wife  of  another  man,  had  first  ordered  the  husband  to  be 
killed  and  had  then  married  the  widow. 

But  of  course  the  King  was  the  King  and  even  then  there 
were  many  people  who  thought  that  David  could  do  no  wrong. 

As  for  the  others,  they  feared  to  speak  their  mind  lest 
they  be  thrown  into  prison  and  get  hanged  for  their  trouble. 

That  was  one  of  those  great  moments  in  Jewish  history 
which  we  mentioned  in  the  beginning  pages  of  this  chapter. 

When  all  the  Jews  were  silent,  the  national  conscience 
spoke  up. 

Nathan  the  Prophet  went  to  the  palace  of  David  the  King. 
He  had  just  heard  a  little  story  which  he  wanted  to  repeat  to 
David. 

David  bade  him  go  ahead. 

‘‘Once  upon  a  time,”  so  Nathan  began,  “there  was  a  rich 
man  and  a  poor  man  and  the  two  were  neighbours.  The  rich 
man  had  many  sheep  but  the  poor  man  had  but  a  single  little 
lamb.  He  was  very  fond  of  his  pet  and  treated  it  as  if  it  had 
been  one  of  his  own  children  and  when  he  did  not  have  much  to 
eat,  he  shared  his  bread  and  his  milk  with  his  beloved  lamb 


176 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


and  when  it  was  cold,  he  hid  the  lamb  within  the  folds  of  his 
cloak  so  that  it  should  not  freeze. 

‘‘One  day  the  rich  man  was  obliged  to  entertain  a  friend. 
He  could  easily  have  killed  one  of  his  own  sheep.  But  no,  he 
must  go  and  steal  the  little  lamb  from  his  poor  neighbour  and 
have  it  served  at  his  dinner-table  for  the  amusement  of  his 
guest.” 

When  David  heard  this,  he  was  terribly  angry.  He  said  to 
Nathan  that  it  was  the  most  dastardly  crime  he  had  ever  heard. 

He  promised  to  inflict  a  severe  punishment. 

The  poor  shepherd  whose  lamb  had  been  stolen  would  re¬ 
ceive  a  seven-fold  compensation. 

As  for  the  wretch  who  was  guilty  of  the  crime,  he  would  be 
killed  at  once. 

Then  Nathan  the  Prophet  stood  up  and  said:  “O  King, 
you  are  the  man.  It  is  you  who  have  killed  Uriah  because  you 
wanted  his  wife.  And  therefore  Jehovah  shall  bring  grief 
upon  you  and  upon  your  family,  and  the  son  of  yourself  and 
of  Bathsheba  shall  die  a  violent  death  to  atone  for  the  terrible 
sin  of  his  father  and  his  mother.” 

David  was  stricken  with  fear  and  remorse.  A  short  while 
later,  his  youngest  child  fell  ill.  That  was  part  of  the  prophecy. 
David  put  ashes  upon  his  head  and  humiliated  himself  before 
Jehovah  in  every  possible  way.  For  seven  days  and  seven 
nights  he  did  not  eat  nor  drink.  On  the  eighth  day,  the  child 
died  and  the  words  of  Nathan  had  come  true. 

From  that  moment  on,  David  regarded  himself  as  the  mur¬ 
derer  of  his  own  boy.  He  confessed  unto  Jehovah  that  he  had 
been  utterly  wrong  in  his  treatment  of  Uriah.  He  offered  to 
do  penance.  He  begged  and  prayed  and  beseeched  that  he 
might  be  forgiven.  Apparently  this  show  of  grief  impressed 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


177 


Jehovah  with  its  sincerity  and  for  a  short  while  David  suffered 
no  further  punishment. 

Soon  afterwards  Bathsheba  had  another  son.  He  was 
called  Solomon,  and  David,  in  his  joy,  promised  the  mother  that 
he  would  make  that  boy  his  successor  to  the  exclusion  of  all 
his  other  children. 

This,  of  course,  was  very  unpleasant  news  to  the  rightful 
heirs,  whose  names  were  Absalom  and  Adonijah. 

Adonijah  was  not  very  energetic  and  did  not  care  much 
what  happened.  Absalom,  however,  whose  mother  had  been 
born  in  the  hot  Syrian  desert,  was  a  reckless  youth,  and  he 
began  to  plot  against  his  father. 

He  went  out  of  his  way  to  make  himself  popular  with  the 
people  of  Jerusalem.  He  was  a  good-looking  young  man  with 
long  blond  hair  which  he  wore  down  his  neck.  For  ever  he 
was  to  be  seen  where  there  was  a  crowd.  He  loved  to  pose  as 
the  defender  of  the  poor  against  the  oppressions  of  the  rich. 
As  David  was  becoming  more  and  more  of  a  despot,  and  as 
taxes  were  going  higher  all  the  time,  there  were  plenty  of  people 
with  grievances.  They  eagerly  brought  their  complaints  before 
this  crown-prince  who  so  suddenly  had  lost  his  claim  to  the 
throne. 

After  four  years  of  such  agitation,  when  Absalom  thought 
that  he  could  count  upon  a  sufficient  number  of  followers,  he 
left  Jerusalem  and  went  to  Hebron,  on  the  pretext  of  there 
making  a  sacrifice  to  Jehovah,  but  really  to  start  his  campaign 
against  his  father. 

It  was  a  terrible  blow  to  David. 

He  had  loved  Absalom  better  than  all  his  other  children 
and  felt  that  he  had  not  been  quite  fair  to  him.  He  could  not 
bear  the  idea  of  making  war  upon  his  own  flesh  and  blood.  He 


178 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


left  his  palace  and  he  fled  across  the  river  Jordan  and  went  to 
live  in  the  village  of  Mahanaim. 

As  a  result  of  his  flight  there  followed  a  period  of  civil  war. 
But  in  this  hour  of  defeat  and  humiliation,  the  people  remem¬ 
bered  David  the  glorious  leader  against  the  Philistines  who 
had  slain  Goliath,  while  they  forgot  David  the  King  who  had 
stolen  another  man’s  wife. 

They  rallied  to  their  master  with  the  greatest  loyalty. 

Soon  the  entire  country  was  divided  into  two  parts.  One 
of  these  supported  David  and  the  other  was  faithful  to  Absa¬ 
lom.  But  the  majority  was  on  the  side  of  the  King. 

A  battle  took  place  in  the  forest  of  Ephraim,  east  of  the 
river  Jordan.  Before  the  fighting  commenced,  David  begged 
his  soldiers  to  deal  kindly  with  Absalom.  Even  then  he  cared 
more  for  the  boy  than  he  was  willing  to  confess  after  his  scan¬ 
dalous  and  rebellious  conduct. 

All  day  long  the  partisans  of  the  King  and  those  of  his  son 
fought.  Many  men  were  kiUed  but  when  evening  came,  the 
followers  of  David  got  the  better  of  their  adversaries  and  Absa¬ 
lom  was  forced  to  retreat. 

He  trotted  away  on  his  mule  as  fast  as  he  could.  But  the 
stout  branch  of  a  tree  caught  his  long  hair.  The  animal  which 
he  was  riding  got  frightened  and  ran  away  and  Absalom  was 
left  hanging  in  the  air. 

One  of  David’s  soldiers  found  him.  He  knew  that  the  King 
had  asked  mercy  for  the  rebels  and  he  refused  to  kill  the  boy. 

He  ran  back  and  told  Joab. 

This  gruff  sinner  had  no  such  scruples.  He  took  three 
spears  and  went  to  the  place  where  the  helpless  Absalom  was 
suspended  between  the  heaven  and  the  earth,  and  he  killed 
him  and  threw  the  corpse  into  a  grave  underneath  the  oak  tree 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


179 


and  he  called  a  negro  slave  and  ordered  him  to  go  and  tell 
David  what  had  just  happened. 

The  negro  went  to  the  King’s  camp  and  cheerfully  informed 
the  old  ruler  how  his  enemies  had  been  defeated  and  how  his  son 
had  been  killed.  David  did  not  rejoice.  He  was  broken¬ 
hearted. 

He  remembered  his  own  crimes  and  the  curse  of  Nathan 
the  Prophet. 

Now  that  he  was  victorious,  all  the  rebellious  tribes  hastened 


THE  DEATH  OF  ABSALOM 


to  make  their  peace,  but  this  could  not  bring  back  poor  Absa¬ 
lom,  for  whom  David  wailed  from  one  end  of  his  palace  to  the 
other. 

And  now  there  followed  another  succession  of  misfortunes. 
The  King  was  growing  weak  and  his  days  were  numbered.  He 
could  no  longer  lead  his  armies  and  soon  there  was  another 
invasion  on  the  part  of  the  Philistines. 

Then  Adonijah,  the  brother  of  Absalom,  began  a  revo¬ 
lution. 

This  aroused  David  to  his  last  great  act. 


180 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


He  ordered  Solomon  to  be  crowned  King  of  the  Jews. 

Adonijah,  who  knew  that  Solomon  was  far  brighter  than 
he  was  himself,  thereupon  surrendered  and  made  his  peace  with 
his  brother,  who  forgave  him. 

But  of  all  these  events,  David  took  no  notice.  He  sat  in  a 
dark  corner  of  his  palace  and  mumbled  words  of  affection  for 
his  son  Absalom,  who  had  been  slain  when  he  dared  to  make 
war  upon  his  father. 

Until  merciful  death  made  an  end  to  his  suffering  and  gave 
him  that  peace  which  he  had  not  been  able  to  find  since  he  had 
broken  the  commands  of  the  God  of  Moses  and  Joshua. 

And  now  Solomon  was  King  of  all  the  Jews  and  many 
things  had  changed  since  the  first  of  the  pioneers  had  left  the 
desert  lands  of  Ur  to  settle  down  amidst  the  hills  and  the  valleys 
across  “the  River,”  which  in  those  days  was  the  common  West- 
Asiatic  appellation  for  the  Euphrates. 

When  Abraham  desired  to  entertain  a  guest,  he  told  his 
servants  to  kill  a  single  lamb. 

Solomon  lived  on  a  different  scale.  The  daily  provisions 
necessary  for  his  table  were  as  follows:  Thirty  measures  of 
flour,  seventy  measures  of  meal,  ten  fat  oxen,  twenty  lean  oxen 
and  dozens  of  deer,  roebucks,  chickens  and  other  game. 

When  Abraham  moved  into  a  new  territory,  he  built  himself 
a  simple  tent  and  slept  on  a  few  old  rugs. 

Solomon,  on  the  other  hand,  spent  twenty  years  building 
himself  a  new  palace  and  ate  from  dishes  made  of  solid  gold. 

It  makes  interesting  reading,  but  it  cost  a  terrible  lot  of 
money.  Many  hundred  years  afterwards  when  the  Jews  lived 
in  exile  in  Babylon  and  wrote  down  the  records  of  the  past,  they 
loved  to  dwell  upon  the  glories  of  the  reign  of  Solomon  who 
according  to  them  had  been  the  undisputed  master  of  all  the 
land  between  the  Euphrates  and  the  Mediterranean  Sea. 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


181 


But  the  subjects  of  the  mighty  monarch  who  were  obliged 
to  do  forced  labour  on  all  public  works  and  who  were  forced 
to  pay  annual  levies  for  the  maintenance  of  the  royal  palace, 
the  national  temple,  the  terraced  fortress  of  Millo,  the  walls 
of  Jerusalem  and  the  three  new  frontier  cities  which  Solomon 
rebuilt  and  fortified,  they  were  less  enthusiastic  and  (truth  to 
tell)  they  were  for  ever  on  the  verge  of  rebellion. 

Fortunately  Solomon  was  a  shrewd  man  and  he  kept  the 
expenditures  of  his  court  within  certain  limits. 

Like  Joseph  and  several  other  great  Jewish  leaders,  Solo¬ 
mon  was  very  apt  to  have  visions  when  he  was  asleep.  Shortly 
after  his  accession  to  the  throne,  he  dreamed  that  Jehovah 
asked  him  what  gift  he  desired  above  all  others. 

Solomon  answered  that  he  chose  wisdom.  The  word  “wis¬ 
dom”  in  the  old  Hebrew  sense  could  be  translated  by  either 
“wisdom”  or  “shrewdness.” 

Solomon  had  his  share  of  both.  He  was  exceedingly  bright 
but  not  rash. 

As  King  of  the  Jews  he  also  was  the  chief- justice  of  the 
nation.  One  of  the  first  cases  that  were  brought  before  him 
was  a  quarrel  between  two  women  who  both  claimed  a  small 
child  as  their  own.  Solomon  ordered  one  of  his  life-guards  to 
take  the  baby  and  hack  it  in  two  and  give  half  of  it  to  each  of 
the  women.  What  he  had  expected,  actually  happened. 

The  real  mother  begged  the  soldier  to  spare  the  child’s  life. 

“For  it  is  better,”  so  she  argued,  “that  the  wrong  mother 
keep  the  child  than  it  should  suffer  death  in  this  terrible  way.” 

Such  a  quick  and  penetrating  decision  greatly  pleased  the 
multitude.  It  made  Solomon  popular.  Not  even  the  follies 
of  his  old  age  could  quite  deprive  him  of  the  affection  of  his 
subjects. 

So  he  ruled  for  forty  years,  from  943  B.C.  to  903  B.C. 


182 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


And  all  that  time,  he  spent  money  like  water. 

First  of  all  he  constructed  the  royal  palace.  It  was  an 
enormous  building  consisting  of  many  halls  and  courtyards, 
all  of  them  leading  up  to  the  Temple.  Inside  the  high  en¬ 
closure  there  was  an  armoury,  a  room  where  the  King  gave 
audiences  and  listened  to  cases  of  law.  There  were  extensive 
living  quarters  for  his  Majesty  and  for  all  his  attendants  and 
there  was  a  harem  where  the  royal  wives  were  kept  far  away 
from  the  gaze  of  the  curious  crowd. 

Everything  was  built  of  stone  and  finished  in  cypress  wood. 
It  took  twenty  years  to  build. 

Then  came  the  temple.  Of  course,  an  ancient  temple  was 
something  quite  different  from  a  modern  church.  It  was  a  holy 
place  where  people  came  to  make  sacrifices  to  the  gods,  or  in 
this  case,  to  only  one  God,  who  was  called  Jehovah.  -No  ser¬ 
mons  were  ever  preached  and  the  worshippers  kept  coming 
and  going  all  the  time. 

It  was  not  necessary  that  the  building  should  be  very  large 
and  Solomon’s  temple  measured  only  ninety-five  by  thirty 
feet,  which  is  the  size  of  the  average  village  church. 

All  the  same,  the  edifice  cost  untold  millions.  The  Jews 
were  farmers  and  merchants  and  had  little  skill  as  artisans. 
The  necessary  stone-cutters  and  wood-carvers  and  goldsmiths 
had  to  be  imported  from  abroad.  Most  of  them  came  from 
Phoenicia  which  was  the  greatest  commercial  centre  of  the 
world  of  three  thousand  years  ago. 

To-day,  Tyre  and  Sidon  are  forlorn  little  fishing  villages, 
but  in  the  days  of  Solomon  they  were  ports  which  impressed 
a  visitor  from  the  land-locked  Jewish  state  as  New  York  is 
apt  to  overawe  a  man  who  comes  from  a  little  city  in  the  heart 
of  the  prairies. 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


183 


David  had  already  made  a  treaty  with  the  ruler  of 
Tyre.  Solomon  now  concluded  an  alliance  with  the  King  of 
Sidon. 

In  return  for  an  annual  supply  of  grain.  King  Hiram 
placed  a  number  of  his  ships  at  the  disposal  of  the  Jewish  sover¬ 
eign  and  promised  to  provide  him  with  the  necessary  skilled 
labourers  for  his  Temple. 

The  ships  which  Solomon  chartered  visited  all  the  harbours 
of  the  Mediterranean  as  far  as  Tarshish  (which  the  Romans 
called  Tartessus)  in  Spain 
and  they  gathered  gold  and 
precious  stones  and  costly 
woods  for  Solomon’s  holy 
shrine. 

But  the  world  of  the 
Mediterranean  was  too  small 
to  supply  all  the  needs  of  the 
great  monarch.  He  decided 
to  establish  a  trade-route  into 
the  Indies.  He  engaged  Phoe¬ 
nician  ship -builders  to  settle 
down  on  the  shore  of  the  Gulf 
of  Akabah,  an  eastern  branch 
of  the  Red  Sea.  There  they  built  a  ship-yard  near  the  town  of 
Ezion-geber  (which  the  Jews  had  visited  six  centuries  before 
when  they  were  wanderers  in  the  desert)  and  their  vessels 
travelled  as  far  as  Ophir  (which  was  either  on  the  eastern  coast 
of  Africa  or  on  the  western  coast  of  India)  and  then  returned 
with  sandalwood  and  with  ivory  and  with  incense,  which  cara¬ 
vans  then  carried  to  Jerusalem. 

Compared  to  the  pyramids  (which  were  then  almost  three 
thousand  years  old)  and  to  the  temples  in  Thebes  and  in  Mem- 


THE  ALTAR  OF  BURNED  OFFER¬ 
ING  STOOD  OUT  IN  THE  OPEN 


184 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


phis  and  in  Nineveh  and  in  Babylon,  the  temple  of  Solomon 
was  not  a  very  imposing  building. 

But  it  was  the  first  time  that  one  of  the  many  small  Semitic 
tribes  of  western  Asia  had  ventured  forth  upon  such  an  am¬ 
bitious  building  plan.  Even  the  rich  Queen  of  Sheba,  the 
famous  gold  land  of  Arabia,  was  driven  by  curiosity  to  visit  the 
new  capital  of  her  northern  neighbours  and  honoured  Solomon 
with  a  visit,  and  expressed  her  admiration  for  what  he  had 
accomplished. 

Unfortunately  we  have  no  foreign  account  of  the  Temple 
and  the  Book  of  Kings  which  gives  a  minute  description  was 
written  several  centuries  later.  By  that  time  it  was  commonly 
believed  and  said  that  the  Temple  had  cost  108,000  talents 
of  gold  and  1,017,000  talents  of  silver,  or  2,450  million  of  our 
modern  dollars.  But  this  was  about  fifty  times  the  total  gold- 
supply  of  the  whole  ancient  world,  and  the  amount  is  probably 
somewhat  exaggerated.  As  hardly  a  single  stone  remains  of 
the  original  building,  and  as  the  site  of  the  temple  now  lies 
buried  imderneath  one  hundred  and  twenty  feet  of  accumu¬ 
lated  rubbish,  it  will  be  difficult  to  form  a  correct  modern 
estimate. 

We  know,  however,  that  the  old  hill  of  Moriah  (originally 
occupied  by  the  farm  of  Araunah  the  Jebusite)  was  gradually 
covered  with  a  complex  system  of  buildings  the  fame  of  which 
has  come  down  to  us  through  the  centuries.  They  were  begun 
in  the  four  hundred  and  eightieth  year  after  the  flight  from 
Egypt  (the  first  positive  date  in  the  Old  Testament)  and  they 
were  finished  in  the  four  hundred  and  eighty-seventh  year. 

All  the  preparatory  work  of  cutting  the  stones  and  hewing 
the  wood  into  the  proper  shape  was  done  far  away  from  the 
hill  of  Moriah  so  that  the  actual  work  of  construction  should 
be  done  with  a  minimum  amount  of  noise.  ^ 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


185 


The  Jews,  who  even  then  rarely  lived  in  stone  houses,  did 
not  like  bare  walls.  Solomon  therefore  covered  all  the  floors 
and  the  walls  and  the  ceilings  of  the  holy  edifice  with  boards 
of  cypress  and  of  cedar  and  these  again  he  overlaid  with  a  thin 
layer  of  gold. 

The  heart  of  the  temple,  the  Holy  of  Holies,  was  a  square 
little  room,  thirty  feet  long  and  wide  and  thirty  feet  high. 
Inside  there  stood  the  carved  figures  of  two  large  angels. 
Underneath  their  outspread  wings  rested  the  Ark,  the  plain 
wooden  box  which  had  now  followed  the  Jews  on  their  pere¬ 
grinations  for  almost  six  centuries.  It  contained  the  two  pieces 
of  stone  upon  which  Jehovah  had  engraved  his  Holy  Laws, 
when  he  appeared  to  Moses  amidst  the  clouds  of  Mount  Sinai. 

Inside  of  the  small  room  there  reigned  eternal  silence.  Only 
once  each  year  the  High  Priest  was  allowed  to  enter  into  the 
presence  of  the  Divine  Spirit.  That  was  on  the  Day  of  Atone¬ 
ment. 

Upon  that  occasion  the  High  Priest  laid  aside  his  official 
garments  and  dressed  himself  in  pure  white  linen. 

In  his  hand  he  held  a  censer  containing  some  coals  for  the 
altar. 

In  the  other  he  carried  a  golden  bowl  with  the  blood  of  a 
sacrificed  bullock.  This  he  sprinkled  upon  the  floor  as  a  sign 
of  atonement. 

Then  he  retired.  The  golden  doors,  decorated  with  the  pic¬ 
tures  of  flowers  and  palm  trees,  were  closed  and  once  more  the 
silent  figures  stood  guard  over  the  Ark  which  rested  under¬ 
neath  their  outspread  wings. 

The  Sanctuary,  however,  which  was  separated  from  the 
Holy  of  Holies  by  a  partition  of  cedar  boards,  was  the  real, 
busy  part  of  the  Temple.  There  stood  the  Altar  of  Incense 
and  the  law  required  that  all  those  who  wished  to  make  an  offer- 


186  THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

ing  should  pour  the  blood  of  one  sacrificial  animal  before  this 
famous  shrine. 

From  morning  till  late  in  the  evening,  the  room  was  filled 
with  the  noise  of  both  men  and  beasts. 


THE  HOLY  OF  HOLIES 

The  Jewish  law  of  sacrifice  was  intricate  and  complicated. 
The  priests,  who  made  a  great  deal  of  money  out  of  these  of¬ 
ferings,  were  forever  making  changes  in  the  regulations  which 
had  originally  been  laid  down  by  Moses.  There  was  a  special 
form  of  sacrifice  for  every  sort  of  sin  and  crime. 

Very  poor  people  were  allowed  make  an  offering  of  un¬ 
leavened  bread  or  of  roasted  grain. 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 


187 


But  those  who  could  afford  to  do  so  were  supposed  to  buy 
a  bullock  or  a  sheep  or  a  goat,  and  bring  these  to  the  temple 
that  they  might  be  surrendered  to  the  priest  for  further  treat¬ 
ment. 

For  the  sake  of  convenience,  such  animals  were  held  for 
sale  near  the  temple  entrance  and  all  day  long  the  air  was 
filled  with  the  loud  noise  of  bleating  sheep  and  mooing  cows. 
In  the  beginning,  the  person  who  brought  the  offering  was  sup¬ 
posed  to  kill  his  own  victim.  Gradually,  however,  this  work 
was  taken  over  by  the  priests  and  the  offering  lost  much  of  its 
personal  character. 

The  animal  was  first  of  all  killed  and  cut  into  pieces.  The 
blood  was  either  smeared  upon  the  altar  of  incense,  or  was 
poured  down  before  it.  The  rest  of  the  animal  (or  a  part  of  it 
containing  the  fat)  was  then  allowed  to  be  consumed  by  the 
coals  of  the  Altar  of  Offering,  which  was  made  of  brass  and 
which  stood  outside  of  the  temple  in  the  so-called  Court  of  the 
Priests,  where  the  smoke  could  easily  rise  toward  Heaven. 

Whatever  remained  after  the  offering  was  then  eaten  by 
the  people  who  made  the  sacrifice,  or  it  was  given  to  the  priests, 
who  together  with  their  families,  occupied  three  entire  tiers  of 
rooms  which  were  conveniently  built  against  the  sides  of  the 
temple. 

When  the  temple  had  been  finished  and  was  ready  to  open 
its  doors  to  the  faithful,  Solomon  dedicated  the  holy  edifice 
with  great  and  solemn  festivities. 

He  invited  all  the  leaders  of  the  Jewish  people  to  come  to 
J  erusalem. 

Together  they  first  walked  from  Jerusalem  to  Zion  to  fetch 
the  Ark. 

Zion  was  the  name  of  one  of  the  hills  on  which  the  original 
village  of  J  erusalem  had  been  situated.  It  had  been  a  fortress 


188 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


which  had  belonged  to  the  Jebusites,  some  of  the  original  in¬ 
habitants  of  the  land  of  Canaan.  Their  king  had  been  killed 
by  Joshua  but  they  had  maintained  their  independence  for 
several  centuries  longer. 

Finally  David  had  captured  Zion. 

He  had  called  it  the  City  of  David  and  had  made  it  the 
nucleus  for  his  future  capital. 

When  he  had  brought  back  the  Ark  from  Kirjath-jearim,  it 
had  been  placed  in  a  temporary  tabernacle  which  had  been  con¬ 
structed  inside  the  old  royal  palace. 

From  there  the  priests  now  carried  the  Ark  to  its  final  rest¬ 
ing  place  inside  the  Holy  of  Holies. 

As  soon  as  this  had  been  done,  a  cloud  filled  the  Temple,  to 
show  that  the  spirit  of  Jehovah  was  present.  Then  Solomon 
knelt  down  and  prayed  for  his  people  and  a  bolt  of  fire  de¬ 
scended  from  Heaven  and  it  consumed  the  offering  which  had 
been  placed  upon  the  altar  and  the  King  and  all  his  subjects 
knew  that  Jehovah  was  well  pleased  with  his  new  home. 

The  feast  which  followed  lasted  two  full  weeks. 

Solomon  slaughtered  twenty- two  thousand  oxen  and  one- 
hundred-and-twenty  thousand  sheep  and  the  other  people  made 
offerings  to  the  best  of  their  ability. 

All  this  greatly  increased  the  fame  of  the  King  of  the 
Jews. 

For  the  first  time  in  history,  his  country  attracted  inter¬ 
national  attention.  There  were  visitors  from  many  lands. 
Trade  became  more  brisk  than  it  had  been  before.  Many  of 
the  Jewish  merchants  established  offices  of  their  own  in  the 
cities  of  Egypt  and  in  those  that  w^ere  situated  along  the  shores 
of  the  Mediterranean  and  the  banks  of  the  Euphrates  and  the 
Tigris. 

It  was  the  beginning  of  a  great  era  of  prosperity. 


189 


A  JEWISH  KINGDOM 

But  the  money  did  not  prove  an  unmixed  blessing.  Solo¬ 
mon  now  rarely  left  his  palace.  He  increased  his  body-guard 
and  he  was  the  first  of  the  Jewish  rulers  to  maintain  separate 
regiments  of  cavalry.  As  he  grew  older,  he  withdrew  com¬ 
pletely  from  all  business  of  state.  He  ceased  to  regard  him¬ 
self  as  the  king  of  a  few  simple  tribes  of  shepherds.  He  became 
undisputed  ruler  of  a  powerful  oriental  nation. 

For  reasons  of  state  he  had  married  the  daughters  of  several 
of  his  more  powerful  neighbours. 

Each  of  these  women,  whether  Egyptian,  Moabite,  Hittite, 
Edomite,  Ammonite  or  Phoenician,  had  of  course  remained 
faithful  to  the  religion  of  her  own  country,  and  within  the 
enclosure  of  the  royal  palace  there  might  be  found  altars  to 
Isis  and  to  Baal  and  to  the  other  heathenish  gods  of  Africa 
and  Asia. 

Sometimes,  to  please  a  favourite  wife,  Solomon  had  allowed 
her  to  build  a  little  temple  of  her  own  that  she  might  worship 
her  own  gods  as  she  had  done  when  she  was  a  child  in  the  valley 
of  the  Nile  or  among  the  hills  of  Aram.  It  showed  that  the 
King  was  still  a  man  of  large  and  liberal  views.  But  it  did 
not  increase  his  popularity  among  the  masses  who  were  strict 
followers  of  the  only  true  God. 

They  had  slaved  and  they  had  laboured  and  they  had  suf¬ 
fered  untold  hardships  that  the  Temple  might  be  built. 

And  now  their  King  (of  all  people)  deserted  the  House  of 
Jehovah  that  he  might  sit  in  the  dim  splendours  of  some 
heathenish  sanctuary. 

It  caused  a  great  deal  of  discontent. 

It  kindled  the  spirit  of  revolt  which  was  to  break  out  into 
open  rebellion  as  soon  as  Solomon  should  have  passed  away. 

We  know  very  little  about  his  last  years.  They  were 


190 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


minutely  described  in  the  ‘‘Acts  of  Solomon,”  but  the  book  has 
unfortunately  been  lost. 

Solomon  died  peacefully  and  was  buried  with  his  fathers 
in  the  family  vault  in  the  City  of  David. 

He  might  have  laid  the  foundations  for  a  strong  Jewish 
state.  His  personal  love  of  luxury  and  his  spiritual  indif¬ 
ference  had  made  this  impossible. 

As  soon  as  he  was  dead,  the  storm  broke. 


CIVIL  WAR 


CHAPTER  XII 

A  WISE  LEADER  MIGHT  HAVE  SAVED  THIS  NATION  FROM 
THE  FATE  OF  ALL  EMPIRES.  THE  IMMEDIATE  SUC¬ 
CESSOR  OF  SOLOMON,  HOWEVER,  WAS  INDOLENT  AND 
IGNORANT  AND  SURROUNDED  BY  EVIL  ADVISORS.  HE 
FORCED  THE  TEN  NORTHERN  TRIBES  TO  RISE  UP  IN 
REBELLION  AGAINST  HIS  MISRULE.  THEY  CHOSE  A 
KING  OF  THEIR  OWN  AND  FORMED  A  NEW  STATE, 
CALLED  ISRAEL.  THE  SOUTHERN  PART  OF  THE 
COUNTRY  REMAINED  FAITHFUL  TO  THE  LEGITIMATE 
SOVEREIGN  AND  IT  BECAME  KNOWN  AS  JUDAH  AND 
JERUSALEM  WAS  ITS  CAPITAL 

EHOBOAM,  who  succeeded  his  father, 
was  the  son  of  Solomon  and  Naamah,  a 
woman  who  belonged  to  the  tribe  of 
Ammon. 

He  was  dull,  ignorant  and  narrow¬ 
minded. 

But  it  is  not  quite  fair  to  blame  him 
for  all  the  evils  which  befell  his  country 
immediately  after  his  accession  to  the  throne  and  for  the  final 
division  of  the  people  of  Israel  into  two  small  and  hostile 
kingdoms. 


191 


192 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


There  were  other  reasons  besides  the  universal  unpopu¬ 
larity  of  the  sovereign. 

From  the  very  beginning  of  Jewish  history  there  had  been 
jealousy  and  bad  feehng  between  the  tribe  of  Judah,  which 
lived  to  the  south  of  the  valley  of  Achor,  and  the  tribe  of  Israel, 
which  lived  to  the  north. 

It  is  very  difficult  to  follow  those  ancient  rivalries  back  to 
their  origin.  The  first  eleven  books  of  the  Old  Testament 
(which  are  our  only  source  for  this  entire  period)  contain 
many  legends  but  little  accurate  history.  The  men  who  wrote 
these  chronicles  were  often  people  with  a  personal  bias  who 
were  trying  to  prove  a  favourite  point.  Not  infrequently  they 
added  little  bits  of  irrelevant  gossip  which  had  nothing  to  do 
with  the  real  story  of  the  Jewish  nation. 

Furthermore,  during  all  these  centuries,  the  territory  which 
the  Jews  had  occupied  was  in  a  continual  process  of  transition. 

Many  of  the  original  inhabitants  had  been  killed  or  had 
accepted  the  Jewish  rule  and  had  gone  over  to  the  Jewish 
religion. 

But  here  and  there  a  village  or  a  small  city  had  maintained 
a  semi-independent  existence  for  a  number  of  centuries  and  it 
is  quite  impossible  to  say  when  Palestine  had  really  become 
a  definitely  Jewish  country.  Let  me  try  to  make  this  clear 
by  a  comparison  with  modern  times. 

When  you  study  the  history  of  our  own  great  west,  you 
will  discover  how  difiicult  (almost  impossible)  it  is  to  state  in 
which  year  a  certain  part  of  the  west  ceased  to  be  a  wilderness 
and  became  a  civilised  commimity.  Often  we  know  the  date 
on  which  the  first  pioneers  moved  their  herds  and  their  families 
into  the  plains  across  the  Alleghanies.  We  know  when  the 
earliest  houses  were  built  in  cities  like  St.  Louis  and  Chicago. 
But  exactly  when  did  Missouri  and  Illinois  drop  the  habits 


CIVIL  WAR 


193 


of  a  “frontier  country”  and  when  did  they  assume  the  outward 
and  inner  aspects  of  the  older  states  along  the  Atlantic  sea¬ 
board? 

It  is  impossible  to  give  a  more  specific  answer  than  “some¬ 
time  during  the  first  half  of  the  nineteenth  century.” 

In  this  respect,  Jewish  history  greatly  resembled  that  of 
our  own  country. 

But  there  are  other  puzzles  and  parallels  in  this  chapter 
which  will  make  it  necessary  for  you  to  read  it  with  great  care. 

There  is  the  question  of  the  names  of  “Judah”  and  “Israel” 
which  occur  on  every  page  of  the  books  of  the  Old  Testament. 
They  are  used  in  a  most  irregular  fashion. 

The  authors  of  the  books  of  Joshua  and  Judges  and  Kings 
often  wrote  Israel  or  Judah  when  they  really  meant  “all  of 
the  land  that  had  been  won  from  the  Canaanites  and  the  Am¬ 
monites  and  the  Jebusites.”  Sometimes  they  were  even  more 
careless  and  called  Israel  Judah,  and  vice  versa. 

To  make  this  point  clear,  let  me  give  you  one  more  modern 
example. 

Suppose  that  a  writer  three  thousand  years  hence  discovers 
a  number  of  hooks  dealing  with  the  history  of  our  country, 
which  have  been  hidden  in  a  deserted  cellar  in  the  ruins  of 
Boston.  He  reads  them  with  the  help  of  an  ancient  English 
grammar  which  he  had  found  in  a  museum  and  he  finds  con¬ 
tinual  references  to  “America,”  to  the  “United  States,”  and 
to  “The  States.” 

How  is  he  going  to  know  what  the  historians  of  the  year 
1923  actually  meant  when  they  used  those  terms  so  indis¬ 
criminately? 

“America”  is  the  name  of  a  continent  which  stretches  from 
the  North  Pole  to  the  South  Pole. 

But  common  usage  had  also  given  the  same  name  to  a 


194 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


small  part  of  that  continent,  situated  between  Canada  and 
Mexico.  How  does  the  future  author  know  that  in  this  case 
‘‘America”  actually  meant  the  “United  States  of  America” 
and  not  the  entire  continent?  Again,  when  he  reads  “The 
United  States,”  how  will  he  be  able  to  decide  positively  whether 
this  referred  to  “The  United  States  of  Brazil”  or  the  “United 
States  of  Venezuela”  in  the  southern  hemisphere  or  to  “The 
United  States  of  America”  in  the  northern? 

And  when  he  comes  across  a  reference  to  “The  States” 
how  is  he  going  to  be  certain  whether  the  name  was  in  this 
instance  given  to  the  country  as  a  whole  or  to  the  individual 
states  of  the  east  or  the  north  or  the  south  or  the  west? 

To  the  J ewish  scribe  of  two  thousand  years  ago  such  a  term 
as  “Judah”  or  “Israel”  meant  a  very  definite  region  and  there 
was  no  chance  for  misunderstanding.  But  that  world  now  lies 
buried  underneath  twenty  centuries  of  accumulated  historical 
rubbish  and  it  is  not  easy  for  us  to  decide  what  the  particular 
“city”  and  “river”  were  to  which  the  Prophets  so  often  refer 
when  they  naively  state  that  “the  men  from  across  the  river 
destroyed  the  city.”  Most  likely  the  “men  from  across  the 
river”  were  the  Babylonians  who  lived  on  the  other  side  of  the 
river  Euphrates.  In  nine  cases  out  of  ten  “the  city”  was  the 
city  of  Jerusalem.  By  the  application  of  a  little  intelligence  we 
can  often  guess  at  such  things  with  a  very  great  degree  of 
accuracy.  But  we  are  never  quite  certain  and  further  explora¬ 
tions  in  Mesopotamia  may  show  us  that  we  are  wrong  after  all. 

You  will  now  understand  that  we  can  make  only  the  most 
general  historical  assertions  in  the  chapters  which  are  to  follow 
and  that  we  are  none  too  certain  of  our  arguments  in  the  present 
chapter,  which  endeavours  to  explain  why  the  Jewish  kingdom 
was  predestined  to  go  to  pieces  before  it  had  even  acquired  the 
outward  characteristics  of  a  regular  empire. 


CIVIL  WAR 


195 


Whether  the  men  of  Israel  (the  direct  descendants  of 
Jacob)  were  more  energetic  than  those  of  Judah  (who  claimed 
their  descent  from  Jacob  through  his  fourth  son  and  a  native 
woman  of  the  village  of  Adullam),  we  do  not  know. 

Whether  living  among  the  wide  and  pleasant  valleys  of  the 
northland,  with  its  many  villages  and  cities,  had  made  the 
Israelites  different  from  the  Judaeans,  who  dwelt  amidst  the 
dark  rocks  of  a  high  and  arid  plateau  and  retained  the  habits 
of  the  patriarchal  shepherds  much  longer  than  their  neighbours, 
we  could  not  tell  you  with  any  degree  of  accuracy. 

But  the  fact  remains  that  almost  all  the  leaders  of  the 
Jewish  people,  from  the  days  of  Joshua  and  Gideon  and 
Samuel  and  Saul,  to  those  of  John  the  Baptist  and  Jesus,  were 
born  in  the  north. 

Indeed,  with  the  single  exception  of  David,  the  south  pro¬ 
duced  almost  no  men  of  great  prominence. 

It  is  an  open  question  whether  it  would  not  have  been 
better  for  the  Jewish  people  if  the  consolidation  of  the  tribes 
into  a  single  state  had  been  undertaken  by  a  northerner. 

But  such  historical  speculations  are  of  little  value.  Ger¬ 
many  to-day  would  undoubtedly  be  a  much  pleasanter  country 
if  Bismarck  had  been  a  Bavarian. 

But  he  was  a  Prussian,  just  as  David  happened  to  be  a 
Judsean,  and  nothing  can  change  those  facts  or  their  influence 
upon  all  future  historical  development. 

This  much  is  certain.  Once  David  had  escaped  the  wrath 
of  Saul  (who  was  probably  prejudiced  against  his  rival  on 
the  general  ground  of  his  being  a  ‘‘southerner”)  and  had  been 
made  King  of  the  Jews,  he  followed  a  very  wise  policy  of  con¬ 
ciliation. 

In  his  eagerness  to  placate  the  prejudices  of  the  north,  he 
often  went  so  far  that  he  incurred  the  hostility  of  his  own  tribes- 


196 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


men.  But  his  kingdom  was  based  upon  the  firm  foundation 
of  moderation  and  compromise  and  it  easily  weathered  the 
revolutions  which  took  place  when  the  sovereign  himself  was 
too  old  to  take  the  field. 

Solomon,  during  the  first  half  of  his  reign,  tried  to  follow 
the  same  policy.  He  was,  however,  less  truthful  and  less  gen¬ 
erous  than  David. 

Those  who  threatened  to  be  dangerous  to  the  safety  of  the 
state  were  ruthlessly  persecuted  and  killed. 

In  the  field  of  foreign  politics,  however,  he  was  more  suc¬ 
cessful  than  his  father.  By  a  series  of  successful  wars  (fought 
by  his  generals,  for  the  King  himself  had  no  love  for  the  hard¬ 
ships  of  camp  life)  he  protected  his  frontiers  against  all  ene¬ 
mies  and  he  assured  peace  and  prosperity  to  his  own  subjects. 

Within  a  short  time  he  had  made  himself  as  popular  in  the 
north  as  he  already  was  in  the  south.  But  when  Solomon 
reached  middle-age,  he  began  to  commit  those  errors  which 
finally  brought  about  the  downfall  of  the  Empire,  as  we  shall 
now  tell  you. 

Probably  for  reasons  of  strategy,  Jerusalem  had  been  made 
the  capital  of  the  entire  country.  It  is  true  that  the  Israelites 
would  have  liked  to  see  the  royal  palace  and  the  temple  built 
within  their  own  northern  domains,  but  they  accepted  the 
decision  of  Solomon  with  good  grace  and  travelled  many 
hundreds  of  miles  whenever  they  wanted  to  make  a  sacrifice  to 
Jehovah. 

Then  Solomon  commenced  to  build. 

Of  course,  other  monarchs  have  driven  their  subjects  into 
bankruptcy  by  the  glorious  ambition  of  their  architectural 
dreams.  But  few  countries  have  ever  been  so  completely 
drained  of  their  gold  and  silver  supply  as  both  Israel  and  Judah 
were  drained  by  the  exactions  of  the  ‘‘Peaceable  Monarch.’' 


CIVIL  WAR 


197 


In  the  beginning,  the  Israelites  did  not  object.  They  felt 
that  they  were  working  for  the  glory  of  Jehovah  and  were 
willing  to  make  great  sacrifices.  But  when  Jerusalem  was 
turned  into  a  gaudy,  barbaric  capital,  and  when  the  King  him¬ 
self  began  to  waste  the  royal  revenue  upon  temples  to  Moloch 
and  to  Chemosh  and  to  a  dozen  other  strange  heathenish  gods, 
there  was  a  murmur  of  discontent  among  the  masses. 

Finally  when  they  were  being  driven  into  practical  slavery 
and  serfdom,  that  Solomon  might  order  further  cargoes  of 
gold  from  Ophir  and  more  shiploads  of  silver  from  Tarshish, 
they  threatened  rebellion. 

But  before  they  took  to  arms,  a  Prophet  had  already  given 
utterance  to  the  national  grievance. 

One  of  Solomon’s  officials,  by  the  name  of  Nebat  (of  the 
tribe  of  Ephraim)  had  a  son  who  was  called  Jeroboam.  He 
was  a  foreman  and  worked  on  the  temple.  One  day  as  he  was 
going  to  his  job,  he  met  the  Prophet  Ahijah  who  had  moved 
to  Jerusalem  from  the  village  of  Shiloh.  The  Prophet  was 
wearing  a  new  coat.  That  in  itself  was  a  very  strange  sight. 
Prophets  were  usually  too  poor  to  wear  anything  but  an  old 
camel’s  hair  shirt. 

As  soon  as  Ahijah  saw  Jeroboam,  he  took  off  his  fine  gar¬ 
ment,  cut  it  deliberately  into  twelve  pieces  and  handed  ten  of 
them  to  Jeroboam.  It  was  a  token  that  Jehovah  intended 
J eroboam  to  be  ruler  over  ten  of  the  tribes  of  Israel. 

Solomon,  who  was  well  served  by  his  secret  agents,  heard 
what  had  happened  and  gave  orders  that  Jeroboam  be  killed. 
News,  however,  travelled  fast  in  such  a  small  town  as  Jerusalem 
and  Jeroboam  was  warned.  He  escaped  and  fled  to  Egypt 
where  Shishak,  a  Pharaoh  of  the  twenty-second  dynasty,  gave 
him  an  asylum. 

Shishak  was  a  clever  statesman  who  regarded  the  growth 


198 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


of  a  strong  Jewish  empire  on  the  east  of  his  own  frontiers 
with  serious  misgivings. 

No  doubt  he  hoped  to  use  Jeroboam  as  a  rival  candidate 
for  the  Jewish  throne  as  soon  as  Solomon  should  have  died. 

This  is  exactly  what  happened.  As  soon  as  the  Pharaoh 
heard  that  Rehoboam  had  succeeded  his  father,  he  gave  Jero¬ 
boam  money  enough  to  finance  his  return  trip  to  Jerusalem 
and  offer  himself  as  a  rival  candidate.  For  almost  two  genera¬ 
tions,  now,  the  Jewish  state  had  been  a  hereditary  monarchy. 
But  certain  forms  of  ‘ 'election”  survived  from  the  old  days  of 
the  Judges.  Therefore,  whenever  the  ruler  died,  there  was  to 
he  a  meeting  of  the  tribes  to  "elect”  the  new  sovereign. 

When  the  representatives  from  all  parts  of  the  land  had 
come  together,  they  discussed  the  political  situation.  They 
were  willing  to  acknowledge  Rehoboam  as  their  King,  but 
before  they  acclaimed  him  they  insisted  on  some  sort  of 
"Magna  Charta,”  or  "Constitution”  (as  we  would  say  to¬ 
day),  that  they  might  be  protected  against  a  too  harsh  execu¬ 
tion  of  the  tax-laws. 

Rehoboam,  who  had  been  educated  in  the  harem  of  the 
royal  palace  and  had  rarely  come  into  contact  with  his  subjects, 
sent  for  a  number  of  ancient  councillors  who  had  served  under 
his  father. 

What  would  they  advise  him  to  do? 

The  old  men  told  him  that  the  country  was  groaning  under¬ 
neath  an  unbearable  burden  and  that  the  King  ought  to  grant 
the  wishes  of  his  national  council. 

Rehoboam,  however,  who  loved  his  ease,  did  not  like  to  hear 
people  talk  about  a  decrease  in  the  royal  budget. 

He  turned  to  the  young  gentlemen  of  the  court  who  were 
his  boon  companions  and  asked  them  what  they  thought  of  this 
popular  demand  for  "economy.” 


CIVIL  WAR 


199 


They  expressed  deep  contempt  for  the  rabble  and  gave 
him  courage  for  the  foolish  answer  which  has  survived  through¬ 
out  the  ages,  and  which  is  forever  connected  with  his  name. 

‘'My  father,”  so  Rehoboam  spoke,  “has  put  a  heavy  yoke 
upon  you.  Very  well.  I,  your  new  King,  intend  to  add  to  that 
yoke.  My  father  chastised  you  with  whips,  but  I  will  chastise 
you  with  scourges.” 

This  was  the  proverbial  last  straw. 

Ten  of  the  tribes  refused  to  recognise  Rehoboam  and  elected 
Jeroboam  as  their  King. 

Only  the  tribes  of  Judah  and  Benjamin  remained  faithful 
to  the  son  of  Solomon. 

In  this  way  the  Jewish  nation  was  divided  into  two  parts, 
which  were  never  to  be  reunited. 

The  chance  for  a  strong,  centralised  kingdom  was  gone 
for  ever.  But  the  world  at  large  gained  by  the  failure  of  the 
Jewish  imperial  ambitions.  Together,  Judah  and  Israel  (com¬ 
parable  in  size  to  the  modern  kingdom  of  Belgium)  might  have 
grown  into  the  most  important  state  of  western  Asia. 

Divided,  the  two  little  countries  were  too  weak  to  maintain 
themselves  against  their  mighty  neighbours  of  the  east. 

First  of  all  (in  the  year  722  B.C.)  Israel  was  overrun  and 
conquered  by  the  Assyrians. 

A  century  later,  Judah  suffered  a  similar  fate  at  the  hands 
of  the  Chaldeans. 

The  Jews  were  driven  into  exile. 

Far  away  from  the  Temple  and  their  homes,  the  priests 
remained  scrupulously  faithful  to  the  letter  of  the  ancient  laws. 

They  forgot  nothing,  and  they  learned  nothing. 

But  the  Prophets  made  good  use  of  this  unexpected  chance 
to  widen  their  view  of  both  men  and  affairs  and  to  study  their 


200 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


own  people  in  relation  to  the  rest  of  the  world.  It  gave  them 
an  opportunity  to  revise  their  spiritual  ideas. 

The  cruel  and  implacable  Jehovah,  who  had  been  wor¬ 
shipped  by  Moses  and  by  Joshua  and  by  David,  had  been 
the  tribal  god  of  a  small  community  of  farmers  and  shepherds, 
who  lived  in  a  forgotten  corner  of  western  Asia. 

Because  of  the  courage  and  vision  of  the  exiled  Prophets, 
the  old  Hebrew  deity  now  developed  into  that  universal  and 
eternal  concept  of  the  Divine  Spirit  which  is  accepted  by  the 
people  of  the  modern  world  as  the  highest  expression  of  Truth 
and  Love. 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


CHAPTER  XIII 

THE  TWO  LITTLE  JEWISH  KINGDOMS  MADE  WAR 
UPON  EACH  OTHER  ALMOST  INCESSANTLY  AND  THIS 
FRATERNAL  STRIFE  SO  WEAKENED  THEM  THAT 
THEY  WERE  FOREVER  AT  THE  MERCY  OF  THEIR 
NEIGHBOURS.  THEIR  FINAL  MISFORTUNES,  HOW¬ 
EVER,  DID  NOT  COME  WITHOUT  A  WARNING.  WHILE 
KINGS  AND  POLITICIANS  AND  PRIESTS  WERE  NEG¬ 
LECTING  THEIR  DUTIES,  A  NUMBER  OF  COURAGEOUS 
MEN,  KNOWN  AS  THE  PROPHETS,  STEPPED  FORWARD 
IN  A  VAIN  ATTEMPT  TO  LEAD  THE  PEOPLE  BACK 
TO  THE  TRUE  WORSHIP  OF  JEHOVAH 

HE  work  of  the  Judges  and  that  of 
David  and  Solomon  stood  undone. 
Their  dream  of  a  great  Jewish  empire 
had  come  to  grief.  A  strong  line  of 
fortifications,  running  all  the  way  from 
Gilgal  near  the  river  Jordan  (once  the 
headquarters  of  Joshua),  to  the  city  of 
Gezer  on  the  Philistine  border,  divided 
the  Jewish  lands  into  a  northern  and  a  southern  part. 

United,  they  would  have  been  able  to  maintain  their  com¬ 
mon  independence. 


m 


202 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Divided,  they  were  at  the  mercy  of  their  powerful 
neighbours. 

We  are  about  to  tell  you  the  unhappy  story  of  an  unhappy 
people.  Centuries  of  civil  war  and  anarchy  will  be  followed  by 
two  hundred  years  of  exile  and  slavery.  It  will  be  a  record  of 
dark  deeds — of  sudden  murder  and  futile  ambition.  But  it 
will  provide  us  with  the  proper  background  for  the  most  inter¬ 
esting  spiritual  struggle  of  ancient  days. 

We  must  know  the  main  events  of  this  complicated  period 
if  we  are  to  understand  the  life  of  the  greatest  of  all  the  Proph¬ 
ets,  who  was  born  long  after  the  last  remnant  of  Jewish  inde¬ 
pendence  had  been  destroyed  by  the  armies  of  Pompey. 

Solomon  the  Magnificent  died  sometime  between  the  years 
940  and  930  B.C. 

Five  years  later,  the  division  of  his  empire  had  become  an 
accomplished  and  generally  accepted  fact. 

It  was  then  possible  to  compare  the  strength  of  the  two 
new  nations.  Israel  was  three  times  as  large  as  Judah, 
and  had  twice  as  many  inhabitants.  Her  pastures  were  incom¬ 
parably  richer  than  those  of  Judah  where  three-fourths  of  the 
land  was  barren  wilderness.  This  did  not  mean  that  Israel  was 
twice  as  strong  or  three  times  as  rich  as  her  southern  neighbour. 
On  the  contrary,  the  very  extent  of  her  territory  was  a  disad¬ 
vantage  to  Israel.  Judah,  small  and  compact,  enjoyed  a  more 
centralised  form  of  government  and  was  better  prepared  to 
resist  invasion. 

On  the  east,  the  rocky  wilderness  of  the  Dead  Sea,  swel¬ 
tering  in  the  salty  heat  of  a  valley  situated  1200  feet  below  the 
level  of  the  Mediterranean  Sea,  presented  an  almost  insurpass- 
able  barrier  against  the  aggressions  of  Moab  and  Ammon. 

On  the  south,  there  was  the  desert,  which  stretched  as  far 
as  Arabia. 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


203 


The  western  frontier  touched  the  land  of  the  Philistines. 
These  old  Cretan  fugitives  had  lost  much  of  their  former  fero¬ 
city.  They  had  settled  down  to  the  peaceful  life  of  the  farm 
and  the  workshop.  They  now  rarely  bothered  their  Judasan 
neighbours  and  they  protected  them  against  marauding  expedi¬ 
tions  on  the  part  of  the  uncivilised  barbarians  who  had  just  oc¬ 
cupied  the  nearby  peninsula  of  Greece. 

Israel,  on  the  other  hand,  was  on  all  sides  exposed  to  the 
attacks  of  her  enemies.  The  river  Jordan  would  have  provided 
the  country  with  a  first  class  natural  boundary.  But  a  number 
of  successful  wars  had  extended  the  Israelitic  sphere  of  influ¬ 
ence  several  hundred  miles  towards  the  east.  And  the  Chinese, 
thus  far,  are  the  only  people  who  have  ever  had  the  patience  to 
build  protective  walls  across  a  desert. 

Several  times  the  Israelites  seem  to  have  been  on  the  point 
of  fortifying  this  region.  The  unsettled  conditions  at  home 
made  this  impossible.  Thereafter  the  Israelites  trusted  to  luck 
and  were  of  course  defeated  by  their  powerful  eastern  neigh¬ 
bours,  whose  faith  was  firmly  based  upon  the  efficiency  of  their 
archers  and  their  cavalry. 

The  kingdom  of  Israel  suffered,  however,  from  another  and 
serious  disadvantage.  It  was  composed  of  ten  different  tribes. 
The  tribesmen  talked  much  of  Union  and  Co-operation,  but 
they  were  as  jealous  of  their  own  rights  as  the  original  thirteen 
colonies  of  our  own  country.  They  could  not  even  decide  upon 
a  suitable  capital.  Shechem,  in  the  land  of  the  Ephraimites, 
seemed  in  many  ways  the  right  spot  for  the  future  centre  of 
the  Israelite  nation.  It  was  a  famous  old  town.  It  had  been 
visited  by  Abraham  when  he  had  gone  west  in  search  of  the 
Promised  Land,  and  was  closely  connected  with  the  last  ten 
centuries  of  J ewish  history. 

But  Jeroboam,  who  had  come  to  the  throne  by  way  of  a 


204 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


successful  rebellion  (and  who  was  for  ever  on  the  defensive 
against  all  sorts  of  real  and  imaginary  enemies),  did  not  think 
that  Shechem  offered  sufficient  safety.  He  removed  his  court 
to  Tirzah,  which  was  situated  further  towards  the  east. 

Fifty  years  later,  Tirzah  was  given  up  for  the  benefit  of 
Samaria  which  was  situated  on  the  top  of  a  hill  and  commanded 
a  fine  view  of  the  surrounding  landscape. 

The  lack  of  a  well-established  capital  (which  has  ruined 
many  a  strong  nation  since  the  beginning  of  history) ,  did  much 
to  retard  the  normal  growth  of  the  little  kingdom. 

The  real  underlying  cause,  however,  of  Israel’s  weakness 
had  nothing  to  do  with  geographic  boundaries  or  political  cen¬ 
tres.  It  was  something  very  different. 

From  the  very  beginning,  the  Jewish  state  had  been  a 
theocracy.  A  ‘‘theocracy”  is  a  country  which  is  being  ruled  by 
a  “theos”  or  god.  As  he  cannot  reside  on  this  earth,  he  governs 
his  domains  by  means  of  a  class  of  professional  priests  who 
give  expression  to  the  divine  will  as  it  is  revealed  to  them  from 
time  to  time  by  dreams  or  by  certain  tokens,  such  as  the  whis¬ 
pering  of  the  leaves  of  sacred  trees  or  the  signs  which  come 
from  Heaven  when  an  offering  is  being  made. 

The  “theos”  (whether  he  be  Jehovah  or  Jupiter)  must  of 
course  remain  invisible  to  the  mass  of  the  people.  His  priests, 
therefore,  become  his  representatives  on  this  earth  and  the 
executers  of  his  commands.  Their  power  is  not  unlike  that  of 
the  viceroy  of  India,  who  rules  hundreds  of  millions  of  people 
in  the  name  of  a  distant  and  mysterious  Emperor  who  resides 
in  Buckingham  Palace  in  London,  and  who  is  never  seen  by 
the  inhabitants  of  Calcutta  or  Bombay. 

Almost  every  country,  at  one  time  or  another,  has  passed 
through  that  particular  stage  of  political  development.  TYe 
find  it  in  the  valley  of  the  Nile  and  in  Babylonia.  We  hear  of 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


205 


it  in  Greece  and  in  Rome.  The  idea  was  strong  enough  to 
survive  the  chaos  of  the  Middle  Ages.  It  made  the  King  of 
England  the  “Defender  of  the  Faith.”  It  gave  the  Czar  of 
Russia  the  opportunity  to  establish  himself  as  the  semi-divine 
head  of  both  his  Church  and  his  State.  Even  to-day  we  are 
able  to  discover  slight  traces  of  the  theocratic  idea  in  the  meet¬ 
ings  of  our  Senate  and  our  House  of  Representatives  and  all 
our  state  assemblies,  where  the  proceedings  are  opened  with  an 
invocation  (given  by  a  member  of  the  clergy)  acknowledging 
the  fact  that  no  wise  conclusions  can  be  reached  without  the 
guidance  of  the  divine  spirit. 

It  is  quite  natural  that  primitive  man,  at  the  mercy  of  all 
the  forces  of  nature,  should  have  appealed  to  those  holy  priests 
who  alone  could  protect  him  from  the  wrath  of  their  gods.  It  is 
equally  natural  that  such  a  favoured  position  in  the  state  should 
have  given  one  class  of  society  unlimited  power  which  was 
never  relinquished  willingly,  and  which  gave  rise  to  those  ter¬ 
rible  wars  which  accompany  the  change  from  a  theocratic  to 
a  purely  monarchical  form  of  government. 

Among  the  Jews  (almost  alone  of  all  peoples)  the  idea  of 
a  theocracy  had  taken  such  a  firm  hold  upon  the  imagination  of 
the  people  that  it  could  never  be  broken. 

Moses,  from  the  very  beginning,  had  insisted  upon  a  strictly 
theocratic  form  of  government.  The  Ten  Commandments 
were  really  the  constitution  of  his  new  state.  The  High  Priest, 
by  his  command,  became  the  chief  executive  of  the  people.  The 
Tabernacle  was  in  a  sense  the  national  capital. 

The  struggle  for  the  conquest  of  the  land  of  Canaan  had 
temporarily  weakened  the  power  of  the  church,  and  had  given 
certain  great  advantages  to  the  military  leaders.  Even  so, 
many  of  the  Judges  were  also  priests  and  exercised  a  double 
influence  upon  the  life  of  the  country. 


206 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


During  the  reign  of  David  and  Solomon,  it  seemed  that  the 
kings  were  about  to  establish  an  absolute  monarchy  in  which 
the  High  Priest  was  to  execute  the  will  of  his  worldly  master 
rather  than  that  of  Jehovah. 

The  revolution  of  Jeroboam,  however,  and  the  division  of 
the  state  into  two  separate  kingdoms  gave  new  strength  to  the 
priesthood,  and  gave  these  shrewd  men  a  chance  to  regain  much 
of  their  old  prestige. 

Adversity  has  its  advantages. 

Rehoboam,  the  king  of  Judah,  had  lost  two-thirds  of  his 
subjects  and  three-quarters  of  his  territory,  but  he  had  retained 
Jerusalem,  and  this  city,  as  the  religious  centre  of  the  Jewish 
people,  was  worth  more  than  half  a  dozen  Samarias  and 
Shechems.  This  will  become  clear  to  you  if  you  will  remem¬ 
ber  that  in  the  tenth  century  B.  C.  the  temple  of  Jerusalem 
had  a  practical  monopoly  of  all  divine  worship  in  the  land  of 
the  Jews. 

It  is  not  easy  to  imagine  such  a  state  of  affairs.  Nowadays 
we  belong  to  a  large  number  of  denominations.  We  are  Meth¬ 
odists  or  Catholics  or  Jews  or  Christian  Scientists  or  Baptists 
or  Lutherans.  But  we  all  live  in  the  peaceful  harmony  of  de¬ 
cent  neighbours,  and  on  Sunday  (or  whenever  we  please)  we 
go  to  the  church  of  our  preference  and  worship  according  to 
the  dictates  of  our  conscience. 

The  ancient  Jews,  however,  had  no  such  choice.  They  had 
to  make  their  offering  before  the  altar  of  the  Temple  of  Jeru¬ 
salem  or  neglect  their  religious  duties. 

As  the  country  was  very  small,  this  meant  no  great  physical 
hardship.  Most  of  the  Jews,  anyway,  did  not  visit  the  Temple 
more  than  twice  or  three  times  in  all  their  lives,  and  then  only 
upon  very  solemn  occasions.  They  did  not  mind  the  few  days* 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


207 


travel  necessary  to  reach  the  Holy  of  Hohes.  But  it  gave 
Jerusalem  a  tremendous  hold  upon  the  people. 

During  the  Middle  Ages,  it  was  said  that  all  roads  led  to 
Rome.  In  old  Palestine,  all  roads  led  to  the  Temple  of 
Solomon. 

When  the  kings  of  Israel  built  the  barrier  which  was  to 
keep  their  own  subjects  separate  from  their  hated  Judsean 
neighbours,  Jerusalem  acquired  an  unexpected  dignity.  It 
assumed  the  role  of  a  sacred  martyr.  The  priests  of  the  temple 
made  common  cause  with  the  kings  of  Judah.  They  refused 
to  recognise  the  “unlawful”  rulers  of  Israel.  They  denounced 
the  “rebels”  of  the  north,  who  had  refused  to  accept  the  “legit¬ 
imate”  candidate  to  the  throne,  and  thereby  had  disobeyed  the 
will  of  Jehovah.  They  practically  excommunicated  all  Israel¬ 
ites,  and  cursed  them  for  their  wickedness.  And  when  the  poor 
kingdom  of  the  north  fell  a  victim  to  the  political  greed  of 
Assyria,  the  guardians  of  the  Judsean  shrine  were  jubilant  in 
their  joy. 

Jehovah,  so  they  claimed,  had  punished  his  unfaithful  chil¬ 
dren,  and  all  was  well  with  the  world. 

Alas!  a  hundred  years  later,  they  were  to  suffer  a  similar 
fate.  And  succeeding  centuries  of  exile  taught  them  the  hard 
lessons  of  tolerance  and  mercy. 

It  is  not  easy  for  a  child  of  our  modern  times  to  get  a  clear 
idea  of  such  a  situation.  If  his  parents  ( for  one  reason  or  an¬ 
other)  do  not  like  their  minister,  they  quietly  go  to  another 
church,  and  do  not  feel  conscious  of  having  committed  a  sin. 
But  an  Israelite  of  the  tenth  century  was  as  faithful  a  servant 
of  Jehovah  as  his  Judasan  contemporaries.  He  rejected  the 
idea  of  his  being  a  “heretic”  as  a  citizen  of  our  country  would 
reject  the  idea  of  his  being  a  political  outcast  because  he  had 
not  voted  the  same  ticket  as  the  majority  of  his  neighbours  and 


208 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


fellow  townsmen.  He  wanted  to  keep  in  contact  with  the 
Temple.  But  the  Temple  stood  in  Jerusalem,  and  Jerusalem 
was  the  capital  of  a  rival  and  hostile  country.  Much  against 
his  will  he  was  forced  to  establish  a  few  holy  places  of  his  own. 

That,  however,  did  not  improve  matters. 

On  the  contrary,  it  made  things  worse.  It  put  him  into  the 
same  uncomfortable  position  as  those  Europeans  of  the  four¬ 
teenth  century  who  dared  to  elect  a  pope  of  their  own  in  com¬ 
petition  with  the  recognised  head  of  the  Church,  who  was 
supposed  to  reside  in  Home. 

We  are  sorry  to  have  dragged  so  many  historical  explana¬ 
tions  into  this  chapter.  That,  however,  is  the  only  way  in  which 
we  can  hope  to  give  our  readers  a  clear  picture  of  the  compli¬ 
cated  and  unfortunate  relations  between  Israel  and  Judah. 

Israel  enjoyed  all  the  worldly  advantages. 

Judah  maintained  her  one  great  religious  advantage,  and 
in  the  end  it  was  Judah  which  proved  the  stronger  of  the  two. 

And  now  we  must  give  a  very  brief  account  of  the  political 
developments  in  the  two  kingdoms  from  the  time  of  the  division 
until  the  era  of  exile. 

The  quarrel  between  Israel  and  Judah  was  rudely  inter¬ 
rupted  by  an  invasion  from  the  east.  Shishak,  an  Asiatic  ad¬ 
venturer,  who  had  made  himself  master  of  Egypt,  and  had 
established  a  new  dynasty  in  that  country,  had  followed  the 
affairs  of  the  Jewish  nation  with  close  attention.  He  had,  as 
you  may  remember,  offered  his  hospitality  and  his  friendship  to 
Jeroboam,  when  the  latter  had  fled  before  the  anger  of  Solo¬ 
mon,  and  he  had  encouraged  his  guest  to  return  to  J erusalem, 
and  begin  that  revolution  which  had  deprived  the  house  of 
David  of  the  greater  part  of  their  possessions. 

Now  that  the  tribes  of  the  old  kingdom  were  engaged  in 
civil  war,  Shishak  made  the  best  of  his  opportunity.  He  in- 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


209 


vaded  Israel,  he  took  Jerusalem,  and  he  allowed  his  soldiers 
to  destroy  the  Temple.  Then  he  marched  northward,  captured 
and  destroyed  one-hundred-and-thirty-three  cities  and  villages 
of  Israel,  and  returned  to  Egypt,  loaded  heavily  with  the  plun¬ 
der  of  the  Jewish  nation. 

Israel  recovered  easily,  but  Judah  suffered  an  almost  irrep¬ 
arable  loss.  The  wealth  of  the  country  had  been  carried  away. 
The  Temple  was  rebuilt,  but  the  exhausted  treasury  did  not 
allow  a  display  of  the  former  luxury.  Iron  and  bronze  took 
the  place  of  gold  and  silver.  The  old  splendour  was  gone. 
There  were  no  more  visits  from  the  curious  Queen  of  Sheba. 

Shortly  after  this  last  invasion,  Jeroboam  died,  and  was 
succeeded  by  his  son  Nadab. 

This  young  man  did  what  so  many  of  his  wise  predecessors 
had  done.  He  went  to  war  with  the  Philistines. 

When  the  town  of  Gibbethon  refused  to  surrender  to  him, 
he  laid  siege  to  the  city.  Before  he  had  made  any  impression 
upon  this  stronghold,  he  was  murdered  by  Baasha,  of  the  tribe 
of  Issachar,  who  seems  to  have  been  one  of  his  own  generals. 

Baasha  then  made  himself  King  of  Israel,  killed  all  the 
relatives  of  Nadab,  and  went  to  live  in  Tirzah. 

He  continued  the  siege  of  Gibbethon,  but  in  addition,  he 
declared  war  upon  Judah. 

There  Behoboam  had  died,  and  had  been  followed  by 
Abijam.  Abijam  had  ruled  only  three  years,  and  upon  his 
death  had  left  the  throne  to  Asa,  one  of  his  forty-two  children. 

Asa  was  a  better  King  than  any  of  his  predecessors.  He 
strengthened  the  position  of  the  priests  of  the  temple  by  de¬ 
stroying  all  foreign  altars  which  were  found  within  his  domains. 

The  forty-one  years  of  his  reign,  however,  were  not  easy. 
First  of  all,  he  had  been  forced  to  defend  his  country  against 
an  attack  of  several  Ethiopian  tribes.  When  these  had  been 


210 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


beaten  back,  the  war  with  Israel  had  commenced.  Baasha  had 
begun  a  regular  blockade  of  Judah.  He  had  fortified  the  town 
of  Ramah  which  commanded  the  highroad  from  the  north  to 
the  south.  This  meant  that  Judah  was  cut  off  from  all  com¬ 
munication  with  Damascus  and  Phoenicia. 

Asa,  who  feared  that  his  country  would  be  strangled  to 
death  by  the  economic  policy  of  Israel,  looked  for  help.  He 
sent  a  diplomatic  mission  to  the  court  of  Benhadad,  the  King 
of  Aram  (often  called  Syria)  who  ruled  in  the  plain  which 
stretches  from  the  mountains  of  Lebanon  to  the  banks  of  the 
River  Euphrates. 

The  Jews  offered  the  Aramean  monarch  a  large  bribe  if 
he  would  attack  their  Israelite  kinsmen  in  the  rear. 

Benhadad  was  agreeable  to  this  plan. 

It  was  true  that  he  had  just  concluded  a  treaty  of  friend¬ 
ship  with  Baasha,  but  in  those  days,  people  did  not  take  trea¬ 
ties  very  seriously. 

Benhadad  gathered  his  armies,  left  Damascus  (his  cap¬ 
ital),  and  marched  southward. 

He  captured  the  northern  fortress  of  Dan  and  conquered 
all  the  Israehte  lands  as  far  as  the  Sea  of  Galilee.  Baasha  was 
forced  to  sue  for  peace.  Judah  was  saved  and  the  road  to 
Damascus  was  open  to  the  Judaean  trade  once  more. 

Asa  no  doubt  had  done  what  seemed  to  be  best  for  his  own 
country.  But  he  and  all  the  people  who  came  after  him  lived 
to  regret  the  day  when  they  had  first  dragged  a  foreigner  into 
their  domestic  quarrels.  From  that  time  on,  whenever  the  po¬ 
tentates  of  the  east  were  hard  up  for  money,  they  let  themselves 
be  “invited”  to  come  to  the  assistance  of  either  Israel  or  Judah 
and  plundered  the  countries  individually  or  collectively  to  reim¬ 
burse  themselves  for  the  expense  of  their  “Relief  Expedition.” 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


211 


As  for  Baasha,  he  ruled  twenty-nine  years  and  spent  most 
of  that  time  fighting  with  the  Prophet  Jehu. 

The  continued  worship  of  heathen  idols  was  the  cause  of 
this  dispute. 

While  Judah  was  a  fairly  compact  nation,  there  still  lived 
a  large  number  of  foreign  tribes  within  the  realm  of  Israel. 
Some  of  these  made  sacrifices  to  Baal,  the  god  of  the  sun. 
Others  worshipped  the  Golden  Bull,  which  to  many  people  of 
Asia  and  Africa  had  always  seemed  the  embodiment  of  all 
that  was  strong  and  dignified. 

It  was  very  difficult  for  the  kings  of  Israel  to  make  an  end 
to  this  most  regrettable  state  of  aflPairs.  After  all  these  cen¬ 
turies,  the  Israelites  still  formed  a  racial  minority  in  the  coun¬ 
try  which  Joshua  had  conquered.  They  could  not  afford  to 
interfere  with  the  private  opinions  of  the  original  natives,  with¬ 
out  the  risk  of  causing  a  revolt.  To-day  in  India  there  are 
many  religious  sects  of  which  the  British  people  do  not  approve, 
but  the  government  wisely  refuses  to  interfere.  There  had 
been  one  great  rebellion,  due  to  a  misunderstanding  of  certain 
religious  prejudices  of  certain  native  troops,  and  that  lesson 
has  not  been  forgotten.  The  government  keeps  aloof  from  the 
native  temples. 

Baasha  had  been  faced  with  similar  difficulties.  There  were 
a  score  of  unheeding  fanatics  in  his  country  who  regarded  all 
tolerance  as  a  sign  of  moral  weakness.  They  were  for  ever 
urging  him  (and  all  the  other  kings)  to  exterminate  the  pagan 
gods  and  the  pagan  priests,  and  those  who  refused  to  recognise 
Jehovah  as  the  only  true  God.  When  the  rulers  (for  practical 
reasons  of  state)  refused  to  follow  this  program  and  commit 
poHtical  suicide,  these  same  zealots  denounced  them  as  enemies 
of  all  righteousness  who  were  unworthy  to  occupy  the  throne. 

Baasha,  who  had  come  to  his  high  position  over  the  dead 


212 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


body  of  his  murdered  sovereign,  was  in  no  position  to  take  any 
risks.  He  was  forced  to  be  very  lenient  towards  those  who 
made  their  offerings  before  a  golden  calf,  if  in  turn  they  prom¬ 
ised  him  their  support  against  his  enemies.  He  listened  po¬ 
litely  to  Jehu,  whenever  the  Prophet  felt  compelled  to  deliver 
his  message,  but  he  refused  to  take  any  steps  whatsoever 
against  the  much  despised  heathen,  and  when  he  died,  there 
were  more  temples  of  Baal  in  Israel  than  there  had  ever  been 
before.  Jehu,  in  his  wrath,  prophesied  all  sorts  of  terrible 
things  which  would  happen  to  the  Baasha  dynasty  as  a  punish¬ 
ment  for  their  indifference. 

These  predictions  came  true  with  alarming  quickness. 

Baasha  had  been  dead  only  a  short  time  when  his  son  Elah 
was  murdered.  This  young  man  was  no  better  than  his  father. 
At  a  very  disreputable  party  which  he  gave  in  Tirzah,  he  got 
into  a  quarrel  with  Zimri,  the  commander  of  his  war-chariots. 
Zimri  took  his  dagger  and  stabbed  Elah.  Then  he  proclaimed 
himself  King  of  Israel  and  took  possession  of  the  royal  palace. 

This  brazen  act  of  violence  was  too  much  for  the  people, 
accustomed  as  they  were  to  murder  and  bloodshed.  They  sent 
messengers  to  Omri,  the  commander-in-chief  of  the  army,  who 
was  finishing  the  siege  of  Gibbethon  and  asked  him  to  return 
to  the  capital  and  establish  order.  When  Zimri  heard  that  the 
army  was  marching  against  Tirzah,  he  lost  courage.  He  set 
fire  to  his  palace  and  to  the  city  and  less  than  a  week  after  his 
accession  to  the  throne,  he  perished  amidst  the  flames  of  his 
own  capital. 

As  Zimri  had  assassinated  all  the  brothers  of  Elah  during 
the  six  days  of  his  reign,  there  was  no  legitimate  candidate  for 
the  throne.  Omri,  as  the  only  logical  candidate,  was  made 
King.  He  decided  to  leave  the  ruins  of  Tirzah,  and  he  began 
to  look  for  a  suitable  location  for  his  own  capital. 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


213 


This  he  found  further  towards  the  west  on  the  top  of  a  hill 
which  belonged  to  a  farmer  by  the  name  of  Shemer.  Omri 
bought  the  hill  for  two  talents  (or  about  3,000  dollars)  and 
there  built  a  city  which  was  called  the  town  of  Shemer,  or 
Samaria. 

Among  the  many  rulers  who  succeeded  each  other  in  such 
rapid  succession  to  the  throne  of  Israel,  Omri  was  by  far  the 
most  important.  Whatever  his  failings,  he  could  at  least  fight. 
He  spent  twelve  years  of  his  reign  making  war  upon  Ben- 
hadad.  It  was  a  very  uneven  struggle,  but  Omri  held  his  own, 
and  even  added  small  bits  of  territory  to  his  old  possessions. 

When  he  died,  he  left  a  greatly  increased  kingdom  to  his 
son  Ahab. 

With  Ahab,  the  real  troubles  of  Israel  began. 

For  Ahab  was  weak,  but  his  wife  Jezebel  was  strong. 

Soon  the  woman  was  the  real  ruler  of  Israel  and  all  the 
people  were  made  aware  of  this  fact. 

Jezebel  was  the  daughter  of  Ethbaal,  the  king  of  the 
Phoenician  city  of  Sidon.  The  Phoenicians  were  sun-worship¬ 
pers  and  Jezebel  was  a  devout  adherent  of  the  Baal  faith.  As 
a  rule,  queens  adopt  the  religion  of  the  country  of  their  hus¬ 
bands.  Jezebel,  however,  did  nothing  of  the  sort.  When  she 
came  to  Samaria,  she  brought  her  own  priests  with  her  and  as 
soon  as  she  had  established  herself  in  Ahab’s  palace,  she  began 
to  erect  a  temple  to  Baal  in  the  very  heart  of  the  Israelite 
capital. 

The  people  were  shocked  and  the  prophets  cried  out  to  high 
Heaven.  But  Jezebel  did  not  care  and  ere  long,  she  began  a 
regular  campaign  against  those  who  had  remained  faithful  to 
Jehovah  and  inaugurated  a  reign  of  religious  terror  which 
lasted  until  she  was  overthrown  by  the  revolution  of  Jehu. 

Fortunately  for  the  persecuted  followers  of  Jehovah,  the 


214 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


kingdom  of  the  south  just  then  was  ruled  by  a  very  wise  and 
intelligent  king  who  was  called  J ehoshaphat.  He  was  the  son 
of  Asa.  He  had  been  carefully  trained  for  his  high  office,  and 
was  a  diplomat  and  strategist  of  no  mean  ability. 

Jehoshaphat  knew  that  his  own  kingdom  was  inferior  to 
that  of  Israel  when  it  came  to  a  contest  of  arms. 

He  therefore  established  a  truce  between  the  two  countries. 
First  of  all,  he  married  Athaliah,  the  daughter  of  Ahab  and 
Jezebel,  and  next  he  concluded  an  offensive  and  defensive 
treaty  with  his  new  father-in-law.  When  in  this  way  he  had  ob¬ 
tained  a  guarantee  of  safety  for  his  northern  frontier,  he  at¬ 
tacked  the  Ammonites  and  Moabites  who  lived  across  the  Dead 
Sea  and  conquered  their  territory.  This  brought  him  great 
fame,  but  it  did  not  placate  the  anger  of  the  old  Prophet  Jehu, 
who  upbraided  him  for  his  friendly  attitude  towards  the  wicked 
Jezebel,  and  who  denounced  the  treaty  with  Israel  as  a  direct 
insult  to  Jehovah. 

Notwithstanding  these  accusations  of  lukewarm  faith, 
Jehoshaphat  continued  to  be  successful  in  everything  he  under¬ 
took  and  he  died,  much  regretted  by  his  subjects,  in  the  year 
850  B.  C.  and  was  buried  with  his  fathers  in  the  family  vault 
in  the  city  of  David. 

So  much  for  the  history  of  Judah  during  the  first  half  of 
the  ninth  century.  In  Israel  we  shall  see  a  very  different 
picture. 

In  that  poor  country,  everything  was  going  to  rack  and 
ruin. 

Jezebel  had  established  a  veritable  inquisition  which  pun¬ 
ished  with  death  or  exile  all  those  who  refused  to  worship  the 
sun-god.  Nothing  seemed  to  be  able  to  stop  this  wholesale 
and  enforced  conversion  of  an  entire  nation. 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


215 


But  as  always  before,  in  the  hour  of  need,  the  national  con¬ 
science  was  stirred  into  action. 

The  Prophet  Elijah  stepped  forward  and  saved  the  people 
from  utter  degradation. 

We  know  very  little  about  the  early  years  of  this  remark¬ 
able  man.  He  may  have  been  a  native  of  the  land  of  Gahlee 
(the  home  of  so  many  of  the  great  prophets)  but  this  is  not 
certain.  The  greater  part  of  his  younger  years  he  spent  in 
the  wilderness  of  Gilead  on  the  eastern  bank  of  the  river  Jor¬ 
dan  and  his  life  was  influenced  by  his  physical  surroundings. 
He  was  essentially  a  man  of  the  old  school.  He  accepted  Je¬ 
hovah  as  his  master  without  reasoning,  without  arguing  and 
without  questioning. 

He  preferred  the  simple  and  uncomfortable  ways  of  the 
desert  to  the  ease  of  the  cities.  Indeed,  he  abhorred  all  cities. 
To  him  they  were  the  hotbed  of  luxury  and  religious  indiffer¬ 
ence.  They  tolerated  and  even  welcomed  strange  gods  brought 
thither  from  Phoenicia  and  from  Egypt  and  from  Nineveh. 
They  were  the  breeding  place  of  heresy  and  ought  to  be  wiped 
from  the  face  of  this  earth,  together  with  most  of  their  inhabi¬ 
tants. 

From  the  point  of  view  of  Ahab  and  Jezebel,  the  Prophet 
Elijah  was  an  exceedingly  dangerous  man. 

He  had  a  sublime  confidence  in  the  righteousness  of  the 
cause  which  he  had  espoused. 

He  was  as  brave  as  a  lion. 

He  was  without  a  single  worldly  ambition. 

He  despised  personal  possessions. 

A  rough  coat,  made  of  the  hairy  skin  of  a  camel,  was  his 
only  garment. 

He  ate  whatever  charitable  people  gave  him. 


216 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


In  case  of  extreme  need,  he  was  fed  (so  people  told  each 
other)  by  the  ravens. 

In  short,  he  was  absolutely  invulnerable,  for  there  were  no 
ties  which  bound  him  to  this  world,  and  death,  however  violent, 
meant  nothing  to  a  man  whose  whole  being  was  dedicated  to 
the  service  of  his  God. 

No  wonder  that  such  a  teacher  made  a  deep  impression 
upon  his  contemporaries. 

Elijah  led  a  very  restless  hfe,  and  he  had  a  strong  sense 
of  the  dramatic.  Suddenly  he  would  appear  in  the  market 
place  of  a  distant  city.  He  would  utter  ominous  words  of 
warning.  Before  the  people  had  a  chance  to  recover  from 
their  surprise,  the  Prophet  was  gone  again. 

A  few  days  later,  he  would  be  seen  in  a  different  part  of 
the  country  and  again  he  would  disappear  as  mysteriously  as 
he  had  come. 

Until  the  people  believed  that  he  was  possessed  of  some 
strange  power,  and  could  make  himself  invisible  at  will. 

Ever  since  the  beginning  of  time,  people  have  loved  to  ex¬ 
aggerate  the  virtues  of  their  heroes.  As  time  went  by  (and  as 
the  stories  were  repeated  from  father  to  son)  Elijah  assumed 
more  and  more  the  character  of  a  great  magician.  His  words 
of  wisdom  were  forgotten.  But  his  miracles  were  remembered 
and  hundreds  of  years  after  his  death,  the  J ewish  mothers  used 
to  tell  their  children  of  a  wonderful  man  who  could  reverse  all 
the  laws  of  nature,  who  could  stop  the  flow  of  rivers  by  a  ges¬ 
ture  of  his  hand,  who  could  turn  one  bushel  of  corn  into  a 
dozen,  who  upon  many  an  occasion  had  cured  the  sick,  and 
who  sometimes  had  raised  the  dead  with  equal  facihty. 

This  tremendous  figure,  feared  and  yet  revered  by  all  his 
contemporaries,  now  became  one  of  the  leading  actors  in  the 
great  religious  drama  of  his  time. 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


217 


Like  a  bolt  of  lightning  from  high  Heaven,  the  Prophet 
fell  upon  the  unsuspecting  Ahab.  The  king  had  just  made 
some  further  concessions  to  Baal.  He  was  to  hear  his  punish¬ 
ment. 

“There  will  be  a  drought  in  the  land,”  so  Elijah  spoke,  “and 
there  will  be  famine  and  there 
will  be  pestilence,  for  Jehovah 
will  not  tolerate  the  sin  of  idol¬ 
atry.” 

The  next  moment  he  was 
gone.  The  soldiers  of  Ahab 
looked  for  him  in  vain.  He 
had  quickly  crossed  the  high 
plateau  of  Israel,  and  had  re¬ 
turned  to  his  beloved  desert.  A 
simple  hut,  on  the  banks  of  a 
deep  gorge,  called  the  Brook 
Cherith,  was  his  home.  There 
he  remained  until  late  in  the 
summer  when  the  lack  of  drink¬ 
ing  water  forced  him  to  look  for  new  quarters.  He  now 
crossed  the  country  from  the  east  to  the  west  until  he  reached 
the  village  of  Zarephath,  on  the  coast  of  the  Mediterranean. 
This  was  situated  within  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Phoenician  city 
of  Tyre.  But  Elijah’s  reputation  as  a  wonder-worker  fol¬ 
lowed  him  even  among  the  heathen,  for  we  hear  stories  of  how 
he  raised  the  dead  son  of  his  landlady,  and  how  he  kept  that 
faithful  woman  well  provided  with  oil  and  flour  through  the 
many  years  of  hunger  which  followed  in  the  wake  of  the  ruined 
crops. 

But  if  Elijah  had  expected  that  the  misery  of  his  subjects 
would  bring  the  wicked  King  to  reason,  he  was  mistaken.  On 


ELIJAH  APPEARS  SUDDENLY 
OUTSIDE  THE  GATE  OF 
AHAB’S  PALACE 


218 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


the  contrary.  This  national  calamity  so  greatly  incensed  Jeze¬ 
bel  that  she  persecuted  the  followers  of  Jehovah  more  unmer¬ 
cifully  than  ever  before.  Only  a  few  of  the  faithful  old  priests 
survived,  but  they  depended  for  their  support  upon  Obadiah, 
the  master  of  the  palace  of  Ahab,  who  was  a  good  man, 
and  who  hid  them  in  his  palace.  Before  they  too  should  be 
killed,  Jehovah  decided  to  save  them. 

He  ordered  Elijah  to  return 
to  Israel  and  address  the  King 
once  more. 

Of  course,  Elijah  knew  that 
he  took  his  hfe  in  his  hands  the 
moment  he  crossed  the  border 
of  Israel. 

He  waited  outside  the  royal 
residence  until  he  met  Obadiah 
(who  was  looking  for  grazing 
fields  for  the  King’s  horses), 
and  he  bade  this  excellent  man 
prepare  Ahab  for  another  solemn  visit  of  Jehovah’s  messenger. 

Once  more,  the  King  and  the  Prophet  faced  each  other. 

Ahab,  who  was  in  dreadful  fear  of  Elijah’s  magic  power, 
listened  patiently  enough,  and  did  as  he  was  told  to  do.  He 
called  together  all  the  priests  of  Baal.  He  told  them  to  come 
to  the  top  of  Mount  Carmel,  which  dominated  the  great  plain 
of  Jezreel,  and  not  to  tarry  by  the  way.  Unless  there  was  im¬ 
mediate  relief  from  hunger  and  thirst,  there  would  be  a  revo¬ 
lution,  and  this  meeting  (so  Ahab  was  told)  might  give  him 
the  opportunity  to  save  his  country. 

From  far  and  wide  the  priests  of  Baal  hastened  to  Mount 
Carmel. 

The  people,  hoping  to  witness  an  exhibition  of  Elijah’s 
strange  magic,  were  present  in  large  numbers. 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


219 


They  saw  a  lonely  old  man  standing  in  front  in  a  neglected 
and  half-ruined  stone  altar  which  had  been  erected  hundreds 
of  years  before  when  the  earliest  settlers  had  taken  possession 
of  the  land. 

When  all  the  Baal  priests  seemed  to  be  present,  Elijah 
addressed  the  multitude. 

There  seemed  to  be  some  doubt,  so  he  said,  who  was  might¬ 
ier,  Jehovah  or  Baal.  Very 
well.  That  question  was  to  be 
decided  now  and  for  all  time. 

Then  he  asked  for  two  young 
bulls.  One  of  these  he  gave  to 
his  enemies,  that  they  might 
prepare  it  ready  for  sacrifice. 

The  other  he  kept  for  himself. 

When  the  animals  had  been 
killed,  the  pieces  of  meat  were 
laid  upon  the  wood  of  the  altars. 

“Now  we  will  wait  for  a 
miracle,”  Elijah  announced. 

“Neither  of  us  will  use  fire  to 
light  the  wood  of  our  altar,  but  we  will  each  pray  to  our  god, 
and  then  we  will  see  what  happens.” 

All  day  long,  the  heathen  threw  themselves  upon  their 
faces  before  Baal,  asking  him  to  come  to  their  assistance.  But 
their  altar  remained  as  cold  as  the  waters  of  the  river  Kishon. 
They  shouted  and  chanted  strange  incantations,  but  nothing 
happened. 

Elijah  taunted  them. 

“A  wonderful  god,  this  Baal  of  yours,”  he  cried,  forget¬ 
ting  the  danger  in  which  he  stood,  “a  noble  god,  who  cannot 
even  come  to  the  rescue  of  his  own  people.  Perhaps  your  Baal 


ELIJAH’S  SACRIFICE 


220 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


has  gone  on  a  journey.  Perhaps  he  is  asleep.  Shout  a  little 
louder.  He  may  hear  you  yet.’’ 

But  nothing  happened. 

Elijah  allowed  them  until  evening. 

Then  he  asked  the  people  to  step  close  and  watch  him. 

He  took  twelve  stones  (as  a  symbol  of  the  twelve  tribes 
of  the  old  Jewish  nation)  and  with  these  he  repaired  the  altar. 
Next  he  dug  a  trench  around  it  so  that  it  should  stand  isolated 
from  everybody  and  everything. 

Finally,  to  impress  the  crowd,  he  asked  some  men  to  pour 
out  barrels  of  water  over  the  wood  and  over  the  stones. 

When  this  had  been  done  three  times,  and  the  whole  altar 
was  thoroughly  drenched,  Elijah  called  upon  the  God  of 
Abraham  and  Isaac  and  Israel. 

Immediately  a  holt  of  fire  fell  from  Heaven. 

Amidst  the  hissing  of  steam  and  the  crackling  of  the  wet 
branches,  the  offering  of  Elijah  went  up  into  smoke. 

The  power  of  Jehovah  stood  revealed  before  all  the  people. 

Elijah  made  good  use  of  that  moment  of  victory. 

‘‘Destroy  these  impostors,”  he  shouted,  pointing  to  the 
prophets  of  Baal,  and  the  Israelites  fell  upon  the  foreign 
intruders,  and  they  took  them  to  the  bank  of  the  river  Kishon, 
and  they  killed  every  single  one  of  the  four-hundred-and-fifty 
false  priests. 

Then  Elijah  turned  once  more  to  Ahab.  Jehovah,  he  now 
told  him,  was  satisfied.  Before  evening,  the  drought  would 
come  to  an  end. 

With  this  promise  ringing  in  his  ears,  Ahab  returned  to 
his  residence.  Before  he  had  driven  half  a  mile,  the  sky  was 
darkened  by  the  clouds  which  suddenly  came  up  from  the  sea. 
A  few  minutes  later  it  began  to  rain.  The  rain  poured  down 
upon  the  parched  fields.  For  the  first  time  in  three  years  and 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS  221 

six  months,  the  soil  of  Israel  felt  the  touch  of  a  drop  of  water. 

When  Ahab  told  his  wife  what  had  happened  that  after¬ 
noon,  the  Queen  was  beside  herself  with  anger.  She  gave 
orders  that  Elijah  be  taken  and  be  brought  to  justice  for  the 
murder  of  her  friends. 

Elijah,  however,  had  disappeared.  He  knew  that  this 
time  he  could  not  hope  for  mercy,  and  he  hid  himself  with 
unusual  care.  He  walked  clear  through  Israel  and  Judah  and 
did  not  stop  until  he  had  reached  the  village  of  Beer- Sheba, 
on  the  southern  frontier  of  the  southern  kingdom. 

Even  there  he  did  not  feel  quite  safe.  Soon  he  pushed 
further  into  the  desert  and  for  a  moment  it  looked  as  if  he 
would  perish  from  hunger  and  thirst. 

But  an  angel  of  Jehovah  brought  him  food  and  he  ate  it 
and  thereupon  he  was  able  to  wander  forty  days  without  a 
further  meal. 

At  last  he  reached  Mount  Horeb,  one  of  the  peaks  of  the 
peninsula  of  Sinai.  This  was  holy  ground.  Here,  a  thousand 
years  before,  Moses  had  received  the  laws  of  Jehovah  amidst 
the  crash  of  thunder. 

The  experience  of  Elijah,  when  he  received  his  divine  mes¬ 
sage,  was  quite  different.  First  of  all  there  came  a  terrible  gust 
of  wind  which  almost  blew  the  Prophet  down  a  precipice. 

Ehjah  listened,  but  did  not  hear  anything. 

Then  there  was  heard  the  rumbling  noise  of  a  mighty 
earthquake.  It  was  followed  by  a  fire. 

Once  more,  Elijah  listened,  but  he  heard  nothing. 

Suddenly  the  earth  and  the  wind  came  to  rest. 

There  was  the  sound  of  a  thin  silence. 

And  Elijah  heard  the  voice  of  Jehovah. 

He  was  told  to  return  whence  he  had  come  that  he  might 
find  a  worthy  successor  to  continue  the  task  for  which  he  himself 


222 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


was  growing  too  old.  His  days  were  numbered,  so  he  was  told, 
and  there  was  much  work  to  be  done  in  the  land  of  Israel. 

Elijah  obeyed.  He  left  the  desert  and  went  back  to  the 
hated  cities.  When  he  reached  the  plain  of  Jezreel  where 
the  Judges  of  ancient  days  had  destroyed  the  armies  of  the 
Amalekites  and  Midianites,  he  saw  a  farmer  ploughing  peace¬ 
fully  in  the  fields  of  that  pros¬ 
perous  country. 

Jehovah  gave  him  a  sign 
that  this  boy  was  to  be  his  dis¬ 
ciple.  Elijah  stopped.  He 
left  the  road  and  dropped  his 
mantle  across  the  shoulders  of 
the  young  man. 

Elisha  (for  that  was  his 
name)  understood  what  this 
ceremony  meant.  He  left  his 
plough.  He  went  to  his  home, 
bade  farewell  to  his  father  and 
mother  and  followed  his  new 
master,  that  he  might  learn  the  ways  of  wisdom  and  godliness 
and  be  worthy  of  this  high  honour. 

When  Elijah  and  Elisha  reached  Israel,  they  found  the 
country  in  a  terrible  condition.  Under  the  influence  of  Jezebel, 
things  had  gone  from  bad  to  worse.  Other  Baal  priests  had 
been  sent  for  from  Phoenicia  and  the  country  was  as  full  of 
heathenish  superstitions  as  ever  before. 

Meanwhile  the  King  in  his  restlessness  had  removed  his 
home  from  Samaria  to  the  town  of  Jezreel  and  he  was  build¬ 
ing  himself  a  new  palace. 

Now  it  happened  that  a  vineyard  which  he  wanted  as  part 
of  his  own  grounds  belonged  to  a  citizen  by  the  name  of 
Naboth. 


ELIJAH  IN  THE  MIDST  OF  AN 
EARTHQUAKE 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


223 


Ahab  told  Naboth  that  he  wanted  to  buy  this  vineyard. 
Naboth,  however,  answered  that  the  vineyard  had  been  in  his 
family  for  many  generations  and  that  he  did  not  care  to  sell  it. 

Jezebel  suggested  an  easy  way  out  of  the  diflSculty.  Ahab 
was  King.  Could  he  not  do  what  he  wanted?  Why  not  take 
the  vineyard  and  kill  Naboth?  It  was  all  very  simple. 

Ahab,  however,  refused  to 
do  this.  He  dreaded  another 
interview  with  Elijah  and  to 
make  an  end  to  all  further  ex¬ 
planations,  he  pretended  that  he 
was  sick  and  took  to  his  bed. 

Jezebel  made  the  best  of  her 
opportunity.  While  Ahab  was 
confined  to  his  bed,  she  accused 
Naboth  of  high  treason.  There 
was  no  trial.  The  poor  farmer, 
together  with  his  sons  (who 
would  have  been  heirs  to  the 
much  coveted  vineyard),  were 
all  stoned  to  death,  and  their 
bodies  were  thrown  before  the 
dogs. 

No  sooner  had  this  been 
done  than  behold!  there  stood  Elijah  before  the  garden  of  the 
palace. 

He  had  arrived  in  his  usual  unexpected  way. 

His  message  filled  Ahab  with  unspeakable  horror.  Before 
another  year  was  gone,  the  same  dogs  who  had  just  licked 
the  blood  of  Naboth,  would  lick  that  of  the  King,  and  they 
would  eat  the  torn  flesh  of  Jezebel  the  Queen  after  her  body 
had  been  thrown  into  the  streets  of  Jezreel. 

It  seemed  impossible  and  highly  improbable.  Nevertheless, 


ELIJAH  HEARS  THE  VOICE 
IN  THE  DESERT 


224. 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Ahab  was  frightened,  and  tried  to  discover  a  way  in  which  he 
could  escape  his  fate. 

He  had  so  firmly  established  his  tyrannical  rule  over  Israel 
that  he  did  not  fear  his  own  subjects.  If  he  was  destined  to 
be  killed,  death  would  come  to  him  from  the  side  of  his  enemies. 

His  enemies,  as  all  people  knew,  lived  in  the  north.  Evi¬ 
dently  Ahab  must  guard  him¬ 
self  against  a  new  attack  from 
the  side  of  Aram.  Fortunately 
for  him,  that  country  just  then 
was  sorely  pressed  by  the  King 
of  Assyria.  An  attack  from 
the  south,  made  simultaneously 
with  that  from  the  east,  might 
put  an  end  to  all  further  Ara- 
mean  ambitions. 

Ahab  decided  to  take  the 
initiative  and  waste  no  time.  He  sent  fleet  messengers  to 
Jehoshaphat,  the  King  of  Judah,  and  proposed  that  the  latter 
join  him  in  his  campaign  against  Damascus. 

Jehoshaphat  was  willing,  and  together  the  two  monarchs 
marched  northward. 

The  priests  of  Baal  predicted  a  great  victory,  but  Micaiah, 
one  of  the  few  prophets  who  had  remained  faithful  to  Jehovah, 
repeated  the  warning  that  the  King  would  be  killed,  no  matter 
how  hard  he  tried  to  escape  his  fate. 

What  Ahab  did  then  shows  just  what  sort  of  man  he  was. 
He  disguised  himself  as  a  common  soldier,  and  at  the  same 
time,  he  encouraged  Jehoshaphat  to  wear  his  kingly  robes. 

“For  then,”  so  he  reasoned,  “the  Arameans  will  recognise 
Jehoshaphat,  and  they  will  try  so  hard  to  shoot  him  that  they 
will  pay  no  attention  to  me.” 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


225 


But  when  the  battle  took  place,  Jehoshaphat  in  his  scarlet 
mantle  remained  unharmed.  Ahab,  on  the  other  hand,  in  his 
mean  coat,  was  struck  down  by  a  chance  arrow  and  he  died 
of  his  wound. 

His  body  was  brought  back  to  Jezreel.  Just  before  the 
funeral  took  place,  the  royal  war-chariot  was  washed  to  cleanse 
it  of  Ahab’s  blood.  The  inevitable  dogs  which  always  live 
in  the  streets  of  Oriental  villages  licked  up  the  mixture  of 
water  and  blood.  In  this  way,  the  prophecy  of  Elijah  came 
true.  The  war-chariot  stood  on  the  ground  which  once  had 
belonged  to  Naboth. 

The  death  of  Ahab  meant  more  than  a  change  in  the  suc¬ 
cession.  It  was  the  beginning  of  another  long  period  of 
anarchy. 

Ahab  was  followed  by  his  oldest  son,  Ahaziah.  But  shortly 
after  his  anointment,  the  boy  fell  out  of  a  window  of  the 
palace  of  Samaria  and  was  badly  hurt.  He  sent  messengers 
to  the  temple  of  Baal  to  ask  whether  he  would  recover.  Elijah 
intercepted  these  messengers  and  answered  “No!” 

Ahaziah  died. 

His  brother  Jehoram  was  little  more  fortunate.  Mesha,  the 
King  of  Moab,  who  was  supposed  to  pay  an  annual  tribute 
to  Israel,  rose  up  in  rebellion.  Jehoram  suggested  to  Jehosha¬ 
phat  that  they  take  the  land  of  the  Moabites  together  and 
divide  it. 

The  King  of  Judah  thought  this  a  very  good  idea. 

This  expedition  was  followed  by  ill  luck  from  the  very 
beginning.  For  some  unexplained  reason,  the  two  monarchs 
tried  to  cross  the  wilderness  of  the  Dead  Sea,  instead  of  taking 
the  usual,  more  convenient  route  from  the  north. 

They  lost  their  way  in  the  desert  and  almost  perished  from 
thirst. 


226  THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

When  they  reached  Moab,  they  found  that  the  King  had  put 
his  capital  in  such  excellent  state  of  defence  that  it  was  neces¬ 
sary  to  lay  siege. 

The  siege  dragged  on  through  many  weary  months.  At 
last,  when  it  seemed  that  the  town  must  surrender,  the  King 
of  Moab  decided  to  make  a  sacrifice.  It  was  to  be  an  occasion 

which  both  the  gods  and  men 
would  remember.  The  King 
took  his  oldest  son  and  he  killed 
him  on  the  walls  of  his  capital 
(in  full  sight  of  the  enemy), 
and  he  burned  the  body  to  the 
greater  glory  of  the  Moabite 
idols. 

When  they  saw  this,  the 
Jews  were  gi’eatly  disheartened, 
for  they  (the  generation  of 
J  ehoram  and  J  ehoshaphat ) , 
did  not  place  much  trust  in  their 
own  Jehovah. 

They  feared  the  wrath  of  his  Moabite  rivals,  who  had  just 
been  favoured  with  such  a  signal  evidence  of  devotion  and  wor¬ 
ship.  They  said  that  it  would  serve  no  good  purpose  to  con¬ 
tinue  the  siege  under  those  circumstances  and  they  went  home. 

It  was  a  most  critical  moment  in  the  history  of  the  Jewish 
people.  The  house  of  Omri  was  now  almighty  in  both  king¬ 
doms.  In  the  North,  Jezebel  ruled  with  the  fierce  violence  of 
a  despot.  In  the  South,  her  daughter  Athaliah  managed  both 
her  husband  and  his  country  according  to  the  wishes  of  her 
foreign  councillors.  Everjnvhere  the  reign  of  Jehovah  seemed 
to  have  comedo  an  end.  Baal  seemed  to  be  triumphant.  Some- 


A  LITTLE  PILE  OF  STONES  BY 
ONE  SIDE  OF  THE  WALL 
SHOWED  WHERE  AHAB  WAS 
BURIED 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


227 


thing  must  be  done  and  it  must  be  done  quickly  to  save  the 
people  from  the  consequences  of  their  own  folly. 

It  was  a  moment  which  demanded  immediate  and  ener¬ 
getic  action. 

But  the  man  of  few  words  and  big  deeds  was  gone. 

Elijah  no  longer  dwelled  upon  this  earth.  One  day  while 
he  was  walking  with  Elisha,  a  fiery  wagon  had  descended  from 
Heaven,  and  had  carried  the  old  Prophet  to  his  reward.  At 
least,  so  Elisha  told  the  people  when  he  returned  alone  from 
the  town  of  Bethel,  and  they  dared  not  doubt  his  words.  For 
Elisha  had  inherited  his  master’s  power  over  the  forces  of 
nature  and  he  was  a  man  to  be  treated  with  awe  and  respect. 

When  naughty  little  boys  from  the  village  of  Bethel  poked 
fun  at  the  Prophet’s  bald  head,  two  bears  rushed  forth  from 
the  bushes  and  ate  up  the  children  as  a  warning  to  all  others. 
That,  however,  was  only  a  detail.  There  was  no  end  to  the 
things  which  Elisha  could  do.  Like  Elijah,  he  could  make 
rivers  stop  at  a  single  word  of  command.  He  could  make 
iron  float  on  top  of  the  water  and  he  was  for  ever  curing  sick 
people.  Finally,  he  too  possessed  the  wonderful  gift  of  mak¬ 
ing  himself  almost  invisible. 

All  this  stood  him  in  good  stead  when  he  felt  that  the  time 
had  come  to  remove  Jezebel  from  the  scene  of  Jewish  national 
life.  He  deliberately  placed  himself  at  the  head  of  a  revolu¬ 
tionary  movement  which  planned  to  overthrow  the  house  of 
Omri,  and  to  purge  both  Israel  and  Judah  from  the  iniquities 
of  the  Baal  service. 

Elisha  did  not  take  part  in  the  actual  uprising. 

He  was  not  a  man  of  the  sword,  although  he  was  by  no 
means  of  a  peaceful  nature  when  it  came  to  a  matter  of 
principle.  But  the  fighting  he  left  to  a  man  called  J ehu,  one 
of  the  most  picturesque  figures  of  the  Old  Testament. 


228 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Jehu  was  a  captain  in  the  Israelite  army.  He  was  famous 
for  his  careless  bravery.  He  could  ride  faster  than  any  other 
man  and  he  could  shoot  straighter  and  he  was  absolutely  inde¬ 
fatigable  in  the  pursuit  of  his  enemies.  He  was  just  the  sort 
of  leader  to  be  chosen  for  the  dangerous  task  of  upsetting  an 
old  and  established  dynasty. 

Luck  was  with  him.  The  King  of  J udah  and  the  King  of 
Israel  happened  to  be  staying  together.  They  were  closely 
related  and  outwardly  they  maintained  a  semblance  of  good 
feeling. 

Jehoram,  King  of  Israel,  was  the  first  to  discover  the  dan¬ 
ger.  When  he  heard  that  Jehu  was  on  the  war-path,  he  tried  to 
escape  in  his  armour-clad  chariot.  It  was  too  late.  Jehoram 
fell  dead  with  an  arrow  through  his  heart.  His  body  was  left 
by  the  side  of  the  road  and  when  the  soldiers  of  the  regular 
army  (who  followed  their  master  at  a  distance)  found  it  there, 
they  threw  it  on  the  land  which  Ahab  had  stolen  from  Naboth, 
and  there  they  left  it  to  the  mercy  of  the  ever-present  dogs. 

Ahaziah,  warned  by  the  fate  of  his  uncle,  did  his  best  to 
reach  his  own  frontier.  Near  Ibleam  in  the  land  of  Manasseh 
he  was  overtaken  by  the  rebels,  and  was  mortally  wounded. 
He  managed  to  drag  himself  to  Megiddo,  the  famous  old  for¬ 
tress  near  the  battlefield  of  Armageddon  (where  so  many  kings 
of  the  Jews  had  met  a  violent  death)  and  there  he  died. 

When  this  had  been  successfully  accomplished,  the  wrath 
of  Jehu  was  turned  against  Jezebel.  The  old  Queen,  when 
she  saw  that  she  was  doomed,  met  her  fate  with  great  dignity. 
With  great  care  she  dressed  herself  in  the  royal  robes.  Then 
she  awaited  the  arrival  of  the  men  who  were  to  be  her  execu¬ 
tioners.  When  Jehu  reached  the  palace,  he  called  to  Jezebel’s 
servants  and  ordered  them  to  fling  their  mistress  out  of  the 


229 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


window.  A  couple  of  eunuchs  (the  private  guardians  of  the 
harem)  obeyed  this  order. 

Jezebel  was  thrown  into  the  street.  Jehu  drove  his  chariot 
across  her  dead  body  and  went  his  way,  without  looking  back¬ 
wards. 

That  night,  under  cover  of  darkness,  a  few  faithful  re¬ 


tainers  of  Ahab,  remem¬ 
bering  better  days,  left 
the  palace  to  give  their 
dead  ruler  the  funeral 
which  befitted  the  daugh¬ 
ter  of  a  king. 

They  could  not  find 
Jezebel’s  body. 

The  dogs  of  Jezreel 
had  torn  it  to  pieces. 

Next  it  was  the  turn 
of  all  the  descendants  of 
Ahab.  Most  of  these  had 
fled  to  Samaria.  But 
when  they  saw  how  the 
whole  country  rallied  to 
Jehu,  they  understood  the 
uselessness  of  a  defence  and  they  surrendered  upon  such  terms 
as  Jehu  was  willing  to  grant.  He  did  not  spare  a  single  one. 
Their  heads  were  placed  in  two  large  heaps  just  outside  of  the 
city  gate  as  a  warning  to  those  who  might  try  to  oppose  the 
will  of  the  rebel  chieftain. 

A  little  later,  forty-two  other  princes  of  the  royal  house  of 
Judah  suffered  a  similar  fate. 

There  still  remained  the  priests  of  Baal.  Jehu  let  it  be 
known  that  he  had  no  quarrel  with  them  and  felt  rather  kindly 


JEHU  DRIVES  HIS  CHARIOT  ACROSS 
THE  BODY  OF  JEZEBEL 


230 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


disposed  towards  their  religion.  He  therefore  asked  them  to 
meet  him  in  their  temple  that  they  might  discuss  what  ought 
to  be  done.  They  came,  believing  that  he  had  spoken  the 
truth.  As  soon  as  they  were  all  inside  the  building,  the  doors 
were  closed.  When  night  came,  the  Sun-worshippers  with¬ 
out  exception  had  all  been  killed. 

With  a  single  blow,  Jehu  had  made  an  end  to  the  danger 
of  a  foreign  domination. 

The  house  of  Omri  had  been  exterminated. 

The  Baal  priests  were  gone. 

Jehu  ruled  as  King  in  Israel,  and  Elisha  rejoiced. 

The  triumph  of  Jehovah  was  complete. 

But  soon  it  became  evident  to  all  the  people  that  this  vic¬ 
tory,  based  upon  murder  and  bloodshed,  had  accomplished 
very  little  for  the  good  of  the  country. 

It  is  true  that  Jehu  was  brave  and  reckless,  but  he  lacked 
both  wisdom  and  a  sense  of  proportion.  He  was  clay  in  the 
hands  of  a  number  of  religious  leaders  who  now  rallied  around 
his  throne  that  they  might  put  into  execution  their  own  narrow 
ideas  of  a  perfect  state. 

Their  fear  of  everything  foreign,  both  gods  and  men,  was 
so  great  that  they  would  not  tolerate  any  one  within  the  coun¬ 
try  who  was  not  of  pure  Jewish  blood.  They  erected  an  imag¬ 
inary  barrier  around  Israel  and  Judah  which  kept  away  all 
those  who  had  been  born  outside  the  Jewish  pale.  They 
frowned  upon  “entangling  alliances”  with  other  powers  and 
declared  that  treaties  with  other  powers  (who  did  not  recog¬ 
nise  Jehovah)  were  odious  in  the  sight  of  their  own  God. 

But  as  both  Israel  and  Judah  were  too  weak  to  survive 
without  the  help  of  a  few  good  friends  in  the  east  and  in  the 
west,  this  insistence  of  the  prophets  upon  a  holy  separation 
proved  a  disastrous  innovation,  and  it  came  at  the  very  mo- 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


231 


ment  when  all  the  professional  fighters  (the  princes  of  royal 
blood)  had  been  exterminated  and  when  the  army  had  been 
deprived  of  eighty  per  cent  of  its  higher  officers. 

In  the  eyes  of  the  faithful,  the  great  revolution  of  Jehu 
had  purged  Israel  and  Judah  from  all  barbarian  influence. 
Henceforth  the  two  countries  were  to  be  really  “holy  ground.’’ 
It  was  a  noble  ambition,  but  it  was  doomed  to  failure. 

Nothing  has  ever  been  accomplished  in  this  world  by 
murder. 

Even  such  pious  people  as  the  Prophets  Amos  and  Hosea 
were  to  recognise  this  fact  ere  very  long  and  were  to  express 
their  regret  at  the  shedding  of  so  much  innocent  blood.  But 
when  they  spoke,  it  was  too  late. 

Israel  had  already  been  conquered  by  the  nations  of  the 
east. 

In  Aram,  too,  there  had  been  a  revolution.  There  Hazael, 
a  Syrian  general,  had  murdered  his  master,  King  Benhadad 
II,  and  himself  had  mounted  the  throne. 

He  had  increased  the  strength  of  Damascus,  but  when 
Shalmaneser  II,  the  son  of  Ashurnasirpal  of  Assyria,  attacked 
the  Aramean  domains,  there  was  a  sudden  end  to  the  glory  of 
Hazael,  the  usurper.  His  armies  were  defeated  near  Mount 
Hermon,  and  Damascus  was  captured.  When  news  of  this 
disaster  reached  the  coast  of  the  Mediterranean,  the  rulers  of 
Sidon  and  of  Tyre  and  of  Israel  hastened  to  accept  such  terms 
as  the  Assyrian  conqueror  would  grant.  They  knew  that  they 
had  found  their  master. 

We  possess  certain  Assyrian  documents  of  that  era  which 
state  that  the  battle  of  Mount  Hermon  took  place  in  the  year 
842  B.  C.,  and  that  Jehu,  the  son  (which  meant  the  successor) 
of  Omri,  himself  paid  tribute  to  Assyria.  To  make  up  for  his 
losses,  Hazael,  as  soon  as  Shalmaneser  had  returned  to  Nine- 


232 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


veh,  overran  the  northern  part  of  Israel  and  consoled  himself 
with  several  Jewish  districts.  He  exterminated  whole  tribes, 
killed  the  men,  stole  the  women,  threw  the  children  from  the 
rocks  and  repopulated  the  region  with  immigrants  from  Aram. 

J ehu,  not  knowing  what  to  do,  called  upon  Shalmaneser, 
whose  vassal  he  now  was.  But  before  the  Assyrians  could 
come  to  his  assistance,  the  Arameans  ( informed  of  his  treach¬ 
ery)  had  overrun  Israel  for  a  second  time,  had  destroyed  the 
armies  of  J udah  for  good  measure,  and  together  with  the  Moab¬ 
ites  and  Edomites  and  Philistines  had  plundered  both  coun¬ 
tries  to  their  heart’s  content. 

Those  who  had  been  spared  by  the  sword  of  the  invader 
and  had  not  died  of  hunger,  accepted  slavery. 

Samaria  was  the  only  town  which  remained  in  Jevdsh 
hands. 

In  this  hour  of  disaster,  Elisha  came  to  the  rescue  of  his 
ruler.  Together,  the  King  and  the  Prophet  defended  their 
city  until  help  could  reach  them  from  Assyria. 

From  a  purely  patriotic  point  of  view,  they  were  the 
saviours  of  their  country.  The  Assyrians  defeated  the  King 
of  Aram,  took  Damascus,  and  in  this  way  relieved  the  pres¬ 
sure  upon  Israel.  But  when  this  had  been  done,  they  pre¬ 
sented  their  bill  for  services  rendered. 

They  expected  Israel  to  pay,  and  pay  heavily,  and  insisted 
on  an  annual  retainer  which  was  little  more  than  a  bribe  for 
their  continued  good  will. 

The  Israelites  spent  the  whole  of  the  next  century  trying 
to  get  rid  of  this  self-imposed  yoke,  and  sometimes  with  a  fair 
degree  of  success. 

Jehoahaz,  the  son  of  Jehu,  was  fortunate  in  his  war  for  in¬ 
dependence.  He  took  Damascus  and  his  troops  pushed  almost 
as  far  east  as  the  town  of  Nineveh. 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


233 


His  son,  Jehoash,  also  was  lucky  as  a  warrior.  He  allowed 
Elisha  to  guide  him  and  remained  a  devoted  supporter  of  the 
great  prophet  until  the  latter  died.  Jehoash  was  faithful  in  his 
religious  duties.  His  respect  for  Jehovah,  however,  did  not 
prevent  him  from  plundering  the  temple  of  Jerusalem  when 
the  opportunity  offered  itself. 

But  it  remained  for  Jeroboam,  the  son  of  Jehoash,  to  give 
Israel  a  last  taste  of  independence  and  glory. 

To  the  contemporaries  of  this  great  king,  it  seemed  that 
the  wonderful  old  days  of  Solomon  had  returned.  Their  coun¬ 
try,  so  they  flattered  themselves,  was  on  the  point  of  resuming 
its  ancient  position  among  the  nations  of  the  East. 

They  were  to  be  sorely  disappointed. 

That  brilliant  sky  did  not  proclaim  the  coming  of  another 
day.  It  was  the  last  red  glow  which  preceded  the  setting  of 
their  national  sun. 

Undoubtedly  the  first  fifty  years  of  that  century  were  an 
era  of  sudden  and  unexpected  prosperity.  Overnight,  villages 
were  turned  into  cities.  Shepherds  left  their  flocks  that  they 
might  share  the  abundance  of  the  nearest  market-place.  The 
old  trade-routes  were  restored  and  caravans  once  more  passed 
from  east  to  west  and  from  south  to  north. 

But  with  this  return  to  wealth,  came  the  evils  of  an  eco¬ 
nomic  system  which  was  built  upon  speculation. 

The  simple  ways  of  the  patriarchs  which  had  survived  in 
many  of  the  remote  villages  came  to  an  end. 

The  days  of  Solomon  had  returned  in  the  worst  sense  of 
the  word. 

Jehovah  was  neglected.  Soon  he  was  forgotten.  With 
infinite  patience  and  courageous  tenacity,  Amos  and  Isaiah 
and  Hosea,  the  great  prophets  of  the  eighth  century,  laboured 
to  convince  their  fellow  citizens  that  they  were  worshipping 


234 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


false  ideals  and  that  wealth  alone  could  never  make  men  happy. 

Elijah  and  Elisha  had  denounced  the  wickedness  of  the 
world  amidst  the  clang  of  thunder  and  the  flashing  strokes  of 
lightning. 

Amos,  Hosea  and  Isaiah  belonged  to  a  different  type  of 
men.  They  not  only  preached.  They  also  wrote. 

For  by  this  time  the  Jews  had  learned  the  art  of  writing 
from  their  Babylonian  neighbours,  and  they  were  beginning  to 
make  collections  of  stories  from  the  past  and  they  were  copy¬ 
ing  the  words  of  the  prophets  that  they  might  teach  wisdom 
to  their  children  and  to  their  grandchildren. 

Endlessly  Isaiah,  Hosea  and  Amos  repeated  their  warning 
that  the  unreasoning  accumulation  of  gold  and  silver  was  not 
the  only  purpose  of  life.  With  untiring  energy  they  tried  to 
persuade  the  younger  generation  that  pleasure,  while  not 
wicked  in  itself,  did  not  produce  that  mysterious  spiritual  con¬ 
tentment  without  which  existence  is  barren  and  devoid  of  true 
interest. 

When  they  noticed  that  their  talk  was  in  vain  and  when 
they  began  to  foresee,  with  ever  increasing  clearness,  the  in¬ 
evitable  loss  of  their  country’s  independence,  they  changed  the 
tone  of  their  warning  and  uttered  words  of  burning  shame,  the 
like  of  which  had  not  been  heard  in  the  land  since  the  days  of 
Ehjah. 

During  the  greater  part  of  their  career,  however,  they  kept 
away  from  politics  and  contented  themselves  with  a  discussion 
of  the  Truth. 

In  modern  times,  we  probably  would  have  called  them 
“social  reformers.” 

They  admonished  the  rich  to  be  charitable  and  the  poor  to 
be  patient. 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


285 


They  spread  a  new  doctrine  of  forbearance  and  cheerful 
helpfulness. 

And  drawing  a  logical  conclusion  from  their  original  ideas, 
they  finally  preached  the  novel  doctrine  of  a  kindly  Jehovah 
who  loved  all  his  faithful  followers  like  his  own  son  and  who 
demanded  that  all  his  children  should  do  the  same  unto  each 
other. 

Alas!  very  few  people  cared  to  listen  to  them. 

The  Jews  were  so  happy  with  their  newly  found  prosper¬ 
ity;  with  the  conquests  of  their  king,  Jeroboam;  with  the  in¬ 
creasing  volume  of  trade  and  commerce ;  that  they  had  no  time 
to  waste  upon  a  few  queer  people  who  stood  on  the  corners  of 
the  market-place  and  talked  of  coming  disasters,  just  when 
the  whole  country  was  booming  with  wealth. 

When  finally  they  began  to  suspect  that  there  might  be 
some  truth  in  these  words  of  warning,  it  was  too  late. 

In  the  distant  city  of  Nineveh,  a  soldier  of  fortune  of  re¬ 
markable  ability  and  great  shrewdness,  had  made  himself 
master  of  the  throne.  He  called  himself  Tiglath  Pileser,  in 
honour  of  a  national  hero  who  had  lived  five  hundred  years 
before.  He  dreamed  of  an  empire  that  would  stretch  from 
the  Tigris  to  the  Mediterranean. 

Sooner  than  he  had  expected,  the  Jews  gave  him  the  chance 
to  realise  this  ambition. 

Ahaz,  the  King  of  Judah,  engaged  in  one  of  those  obscure 
quarrels  of  which  we  do  not  know  the  details,  was  on  the  point 
of  war  with  Aram.  Ahaz  asked  Tiglath  Pileser  to  help  him. 
When  this  became  known,  the  Prophet  Isaiah  went  to  Ahaz 
to  warn  him  against  such  an  alliance  with  a  heathen.  The 
King  of  Judah  ought  to  place  his  confidence  in  Jehovah  and 
in  no  one  else.  Ahaz  answered  that  he  did  not  believe  this. 
He  even  refused  to  ask  for  a  token  from  Heaven.  He  knew 


236 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


what  he  was  doing.  His  expedition  against  Aram  simply  could 
not  fail. 

But  Isaiah  disagreed  with  him  and  foretold  the  downfall 
of  both  Judah  and  Israel.  It  would  take  place  very  shortly. 
Before  the  children  then  born  should  have  reached  the  age  of 
manhood,  both  countries  would  have  lost  their  independence. 

Even  then,  AJiaz  was  not  convinced.  He  took  all  the  gold 
and  silver  he  could  find  in  the  temple  and  sent  it  to  Nineveh 
as  a  present  for  Tiglath  Pileser.  And  when  he  travelled  north¬ 
ward  to  do  homage  to  his  august  ally,  he  even  took  the  brass 
altar,  which  had  been  standing  in  front  of  the  Holy  of  Holies 
ever  since  the  days  of  Solomon,  and  had  it  carried  to  Damas¬ 
cus,  where  he  offered  it  to  the  Assjn'ian  King. 

Tiglath  Pileser  was  much  pleased. 

Whether  these  gifts  changed  his  mind  and  made  him  more 
friendly  towards  the  Jewish  people  than  the  Assyrians  had 
been  before,  we  do  not  know  for  death  made  an  end  to  all  the 
King’s  plans. 

We  have  good  reason,  however,  to  suppose  that  Tiglath 
would  at  least  have  spared  J udah. 

His  successor,  Shalmaneser,  who  no  doubt  inherited  his 
foreign  policies  from  his  predecessor,  was  very  lenient  to  the 
little  kingdom,  but  he  showed  no  merey  towards  Israel. 

When  Hoshea,  the  last  wicked  king  of  Israel,  heard  that 
his  country  was  about  to  he  invaded,  he  tried  to  make  a  hasty 
alhance  with  Egypt,  but  before  an  expeditionary  army  from 
the  banks  of  the  Nile  could  reach  him,  Shalmaneser  had  crossed 
the  frontier,  had  defeated  the  Israelite  armies  and  had  sent  the 
king  himself  back  to  Nineveh  as  a  prisoner  of  war. 

Then  he  laid  siege  to  the  city  of  Samaria. 

The  Samarians  defended  their  last  stronghold  with  the 
courage  of  despair. 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


237 


They  held  out  for  more  than  three  years. 

Shalmaneser,  so  it  seems,  was  wounded  during  a  sally  and 
died  under  the  walls  of  the  town. 

But  S argon,  who  followed  him,  pushed  the  attack  with 
great  vigour,  and  Samaria  was  taken. 

The  last  resistance  of  the  Israelites  had  been  broken. 

Their  kingdom  came  to  an  ignominious  end. 

Then  began  a  period  of  terrible  suffering. 

Twenty-seven- thousand  two-hundred-and-eighty  families 
(about  a  hundred  thousand  people)  were  driven  into  exile. 
The  country,  terribly  devastated  by  endless  years  of  war,  was 
repopulated  with  settlers  from  five  Assyrian  provinces,  to¬ 
gether  with  the  remnants  of  the  ten  Jewish  tribes.  These  im¬ 
migrants  formed  a  new  race  which  became  known  as  the  Sa¬ 
maritans.  At  first,  they  were  Assyrian  subjects.  Afterwards 
they  were  ruled  by  the  Babylonians  and  the  Macedonians  and 
the  Romans.  They  never  again  formed  an  independent  state. 

Judah  survived  her  sister  nation  by  a  century  and  a  half 
and  only  maintained  a  nominal  independence  by  a  most  abject 
servility  towards  all  her  neighbours.  When  Sennacherib  came 
to  the  throne  of  Assyria  and  began  his  ill-fated  expedition 
against  Egypt,  Hezekiah,  the  King  of  Judah,  bought  immu¬ 
nity  for  his  country  with  a  gift  of  thirty  talents  of  gold. 

To  obtain  this  amount,  the  last  remnant  of  gold  had  to  be 
scraped  off  the  walls  of  the  Temple. 

It  is  curious  that  even  then,  the  people  of  Jerusalem  did  not 
feel  the  utter  humiliation  of  their  country’s  position.  They  ate 
and  drank  just  as  merrily,  while  foreign  officers  and  soldiers 
insolently  sauntered  down  the  streets  of  their  home  city. 

Suddenly,  however,  their  indifference  was  turned  into  ab¬ 
ject  fear. 

It  was  rumoured  (and  upon  good  grounds)  that  Sennach- 


238 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


erib  had  repented  of  his  leniency  and  was  about  to  destroy  the 
Jewish  capital  to  remove  the  possibility  of  an  attack  from  the 
rear* 

In  the  panic  which  followed  this  announcement,  the  Ju¬ 
daeans  at  last  turned  to  one  of  their  prophets. 

Their  King  had  failed  them,  but  Jeremiah  spoke  eager 
words  of  encouragement  and  promised  his  people  the  support 
of  Jehovah,  if  they  would  only  make  up  their  minds  that  Jeru¬ 
salem  should  (and  could)  be  defended  until  the  end. 

It  seemed  that  he  had  foretold  the  truth.  The  armies  of 
Assyria  were  caught  in  the  marshes  of  the  Nile  delta.  The 
greater  part  of  the  soldiers  died  from  fever  and  the  others, 
frightened  by  this  mysterious  disease  (and  by  an  even  more 
mysterious  attack  of  mice,  which  ate  the  strings  of  their  bows), 
refused  to  continue  the  war  and  returned  home. 

Jeremiah  rejoiced,  but  it  was  too  soon  for  jubilation.  The 
enemy  was  making  ready  for  a  terrible  revenge. 

Early  in  the  middle  of  the  sixth  century,  Zedekiah  came 
to  the  throne  of  Judah.  He  was  completely  under  the  influ¬ 
ence  of  several  foreigners.  His  own  comfort  was  his  chief 
interest.  The  independence  of  his  country  meant  nothing  to 
him. 

Assyria  had  gone  the  way  of  all  empires  and  in  turn  had 
been  conquered  by  the  Chaldeans  (another  Semitic  tribe)  who 
had  founded  a  new  country,  of  which  the  old  city  of  Babylon 
became  the  capital. 

This  change  in  masters  made  little  difference  to  Zedekiah. 
Provided  that  he  himself  was  left  in  peace,  he  was  willing  to 
pay  tribute  to  a  Chaldean  as  cheerfully  as  to  an  Assyrian  or 
an  Egyptian.  Such  cowardly  people,  however,  are  apt  to  be 
rash,  when  for  once  in  their  lives,  they  ought  to  be  cautious. 

When  Nebuchadnezzar,  the  Chaldean  ruler,  got  into 


THE  CAPTIVES 


i 


•: 


A:^ 


i! 


!• 


I 


; 


X- 


:^r 


-:<  ,  ,  ,- 


vv 

••<  , 


i-  ^ 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


239 


trouble  with  Egypt,  Zedekiah  willingly  listened  to  those  of  his 
friends  who  told  him  that  the  time  had  come  for  some  great 
deed  which  should  bring  everlasting  renown  to  Judah  and  to 
her  King. 

In  vain  did  Jeremiah,  now  a  prophet  of  woe,  raise  his  voice 
against  such  folly. 

He  appeared  before  the  King  and  warned  him  that  an 
attempt  at  revolution  could  only  end  in  disaster. 

Zedekiah,  in  his  new  enthusiasm,  refused  to  listen  to  all 
arguments. 

In  vain  Jeremiah  reminded  the  King  that  he  had  already 
served  four  other  Judsean  kings  and  had  never  been  found 
wanting. 

Zedekiah  simply  grew  angry  and  sent  Jeremiah  away. 

Suddenly  he  refused  to  pay  the  annual  tribute  to  Chaldea 
and  declared  himself  independent.  At  once  his  capital  was 
infested  by  the  soldiers  of  Nebuchadnezzar. 

Jerusalem  was  not  prepared  for  a  long  siege. 

There  was  a  lack  of  food  and  a  lack  of  water,  and  soon 
pestilence  broke  out  among  the  poorer  people.  Jeremiah  alone 
stood  steadfast  and  would  not  hear  the  word  “surrender.” 

The  people,  weakened  by  sickness,  turned  against  him. 
They  accused  their  faithful  leader  of  having  been  in  the  pay 
of  the  Chaldeans.  When  he  tried  to  prove  his  innocence,  they 
threw  him  into  a  dungeon. 

A  kindly  negro  took  pity  upon  the  old  man  and  released 
him  from  the  dark  pit  into  which  he  had  been  cast,  and  hid  him 
in  the  guard-house  until  the  end  of  the  siege. 

Before  the  official  surrender  of  the  town  took  place,  the 
last  of  the  Judaean  kings  had  deserted  his  people. 

In  the  middle  of  the  night,  accompanied  by  a  few  courtiers, 


240 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


he  had  left  the  gates  of  his  palace  and  had  slipped  through  the 
lines  of  Chaldean  sentinels. 

When  morning  came,  he  was  on  his  way  towards  the  river 
Jordan. 

Nebuchadnezzar,  when  he  heard  of  this,  sent  fleet  horse¬ 
men  to  intercept  the  Judaean 
ruler. 

Near  Jericho,  Zedekiah  was 
taken  prisoner. 

He  was  taken  back  to  the 
royal  camp  and  terrible  was  his 
punishment. 

First,  he  was  forced  to  wit¬ 
ness  the  execution  of  his  sons. 
Then  he  was  blinded  and  he  was 
sent  to  Babylon,  where  he  was 
made  to  march  in  the  triumphal 
procession  of  the  Chaldean  em¬ 
peror.  Shortly  afterwards,  he 
died  in  a  Babylonian  prison. 

As  for  Jeremiah,  the  Chal¬ 
deans,  who  were  a  highly  civi¬ 
lised  people,  spared  his  life  and  treated  the  old  man  with  great 
honour.  They  respected  his  unselfishness  and  his  wisdom  and 
they  told  him  that  he  might  stay  right  at  home,  and  that  no 
harm  would  befall  him. 

Most  of  the  Judseans,  however,  feared  that  they  would 
suffer  the  fate  of  the  Israelites  and  would  be  taken  to  Meso¬ 
potamia  as  captives.  They  prepared  to  flee  to  Egypt.  Jere¬ 
miah  advised  them  to  remain  where  they  were.  The  Jerusa¬ 
lemites,  however,  were  in  a  panic  and  refused  to  listen  to  him. 
They  gathered  their  possessions  and  trekked  eastward.  Jere¬ 
miah,  who  was  the  soul  of  loyalty,  followed  his  people.  He 


JEREMIAH  ON  THE  WALLS 
OF  JERUSALEM 


THE  WARNING  OF  THE  PROPHETS 


241 


was  too  old  for  the  hardships  of  such  a  voyage.  He  died  in 
an  Egyptian  village  and  was  buried  by  the  side  of  the  road. 

It  was  the  five-hundred-and-eighty-sixth  year  before  the 
birth  of  Christ. 

Jerusalem  lay  in  ruins. 

A  Chaldean  governor  dwelled  in  the  land  of  Joshua  and 
David. 

The  smoke-stained  walls  of  the  temple  stood  dark  against 
the  blue  sky  of  Canaan. 

The  last  of  the  independent  Jewish  states  had  come  to  an 
end. 

Judah  had  paid  the  price  of  its  indifference  to  the  wiU  of 
Jehovah. 


DOWNFALL  AND  EXILE 


CHAPTER  XIV 

THE  JEWS  REFUSED  TO  LISTEN  UNTIL  A  LONG  PERIOD 
OF  EXILE  IN  ASSYRIA  AND  BABYLONIA  BROUGHT 
THEM  TO  A  REALISATION  OF  WHAT  THEY  HAD  DONE 
AND  WHAT  THEY  OUGHT  TO  HAVE  DONE.  FAR  AWAY 
FROM  THE  OLD  HOME,  SCATTERED  AMONG  THE 
TOWNS  AND  VILLAGES  OF  THE  VALLEY  OF  MESOPO¬ 
TAMIA,  THEY  BEGAN  THAT  CLOSE  STUDY  OF  THE 
ANCIENT  LAWS  AND  THE  EARLY  CHRONICLES  WHICH 
IN  DUE  TIME  WAS  TO  BRING  THEM  BACK  TO  A  MORE 
SINCERE  AND  EAGER  WORSHIP  OF  JEHOVAH 

HE  new  masters  of  the  Jewish  people 
belonged  to  a  very  remarkable  race. 
Ever  since  the  days  of  Hammurabi, 
their  great  law-giver,  who  lived  and 
wrote  a  thousand  years  before  Moses, 
the  Babylonians  had  been  regarded  as 
the  most  civilised  people  of  western 
Asia. 

The  capital  of  their  vast  empire  was  a  mighty  fortress.  It 
was  protected  by  a  double  row  of  high  walls  which  surrounded 
almost  a  hundred  square  miles  of  houses,  streets,  gardens, 
temples  and  market-places. 


242 


DOWNFALL  AND  EXILE 


243 


BABYLON 


244 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


The  town  had  been  laid  out  very  regularly.  The  streets 
were  both  straight  and  wide. 

The  houses,  built  of  brick,  were  spacious  and  sometimes 
two  or  three  stories  high. 

The  river  Euphrates  ran  right  through  the  middle  of  the 
town  and  offered  direct  connection  with  the  Persian  Gulf  and 
India. 

In  the  heart  of  the  city,  on  a  low  artificial  hill,  stood  the 
famous  palace  of  Nebuchadnezzar. 

With  its  many  terraces,  it  created  the  impression  of  a  large 
park,  suspended  in  mid-air,  and  gave  rise  to  the  strange  myth 
of  the  hanging  gardens. 

The  town  was  as  cosmopolitan  as  the  modern  city  of  New 
York. 

The  Babylonian  merchants  were  excellent  business  men. 
They  traded  with  Egypt  and  with  far-away  China.  They  had 
invented  a  system  of  writing,  out  of  which  the  Phoenicians 
developed  that  handy  alphabet  which  we  use  to-day.  They 
were  well  versed  in  mathematics.  They  gave  the  world  its 
first  notions  of  scientific  astronomy  and  divided  the  years  into 
months,  and  the  months  into  weeks,  as  we  do.  They  devised 
that  system  of  weights  and  measures  upon  which  modern  com¬ 
merce  is  based. 

And  they  first  developed  those  moral  laws  which  were 
afterwards  incorporated  by  Moses  in  his  Ten  Commandments 
and  which  form  the  corner-stone  of  our  own  Church. 

They  were  very  efficient  organisers  and  steadily  and  de¬ 
liberately  increased  their  domains.  Their  conquest  of  the  land 
of  Judah,  however,  was  an  accident  and  had  nothing  to  do  with 
their  policy  of  expansion. 

It  happened  that  one  of  their  rulers  had  gone  forth  to 
conquer  Aram  and  Egypt.  The  little  independent  nation  of 


DOWNFALL  AND  EXILE 


245 


the  Judseans  happened  to  be  situated  upon  the  highroad  from 
the  north  to  the  south  and  from  the  east  to  the  west. 

It  was  occupied  as  a  matter  of  military  precaution. 

That  was  all. 

We  doubt  greatly  whether  the  Babylonians  of  the  age  of 
Nebuchadnezzar  were  ever  conscious  of  the  existence  of  the 
Jews.  They  probably  regarded  them  as  we  regard  the  Pueblo 
Indians.  We  know  that  a  tribe  of  aborigines  maintains  some 
sort  of  semi-independent  life  somewhere  in  the  southwest.  We 
do  not  know  exactly  where  and  we  do  not  greatly  care.  We 
take  it  for  granted  that  some  one  in  the  Bureau  of  Indian 
AflPairs  or  in  the  Department  of  the  Interior  will  look  after 
their  interests.  But  life  is  full  of  a  number  of  things.  We  are 
busy  with  our  own  affairs  and  cannot  bother  about  a  small 
ethnological  group  which  means  nothing  to  us  beyond  a  name 
and  a  few  pictures  of  queer  religious  dances. 

You  must  get  this  point  clearly  fixed  in  your  mind  if  you 
wish  to  understand  what  is  to  follow. 

There  was  not  a  single  early  indication  of  the  important 
role  which  the  descendants  of  Abraham  and  Isaac  were  to 
play  eventually  in  the  history  of  mankind. 

The  earliest  authors  of  world-histories  do  not  mention  the 
Jews  with  a  single  word.  Take  the  case  of  Herodotus.  He 
tried  to  give  a  reliable  account  of  everything  that  had  hap¬ 
pened  since  the  days  of  the  flood  (the  Greek  flood,  and  not 
the  flood  of  Noah,  which  is  part  of  an  ancient  Babylonian 

myth).  Like  most  Athenians,  he  was  both  tolerant  and 
curious.  He  wanted  to  know  everything  of  importance  that 
his  neighbours  had  ever  said  or  thought  or  done,  that  he  might 
put  it  into  his  books. 

He  had  no  racial  prejudices  and  he  travelled  far  and  wide 
to  obtain  first-hand  information.  He  tells  us  several  important 


246 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


things  about  the  Egyptians  and  the  Babylonians  and  many 
other  people  of  the  Mediterranean  seaboard,  but  he  has  never 
heard  of  the  Jews  and  refers  to  the  people  of  the  Palestinian 
plains  very  vaguely  as  an  unknown  tribe  which  practiced  cer¬ 
tain  curious  hygienic  precautions. 

As  for  the  Chaldean  contemporaries  of  the  Jews,  they 
looked  upon  the  poor  exiles  as  we  look  upon  a  group  of  forlorn 
Russian  or  Armenian  refugees  who  happen  to  cross  our  city 
bound  for  some  unknown  destination  in  the  west. 

Which  leaves  us  the  Old  Testament  as  the  main  source 
of  our  information. 

But  the  compilers  of  that  great  national  history  (as  we 
have  told  you  before)  were  not  trained  historians.  They  did 
not  care  how  they  spelled  the  names  of  their  foreign  masters. 
They  were  very  hazy  about  their  geography.  Constantly  they 
refer  to  places  which  no  one  has  ever  been  able  to  identify 
with  any  degree  of  certainty. 

Again,  they  often  deliberately  hid  the  real  meaning  of  their 
words.  They  used  strange  symbols.  They  referred  to  a 
whale,  which  swallowed  a  shipwrecked  mariner  and  after  a 
few  days,  vomited  him  up  again  upon  dry  land,  when  they 
wished  to  tell  how  the  big  empire  of  Babylonia  conquered  the 
little  kingdom  of  Judah  and  after  half  a  century,  had  been 
obliged  to  release  her  hold  upon  her  captives.  This  was,  of 
course,  quite  understandable  to  the  people  of  twenty-five 
hundred  years  ago,  but  it  is  not  so  clear  to  those  of  us  who 
know  Babylon  merely  as  a  deserted  heap  of  stones  and  rubbish. 

All  the  same,  the  last  twenty  books  of  the  Old  Testament 
make  up  in  quantity  for  what  they  lack  in  accuracy,  and  it 
is  possible  to  reconstruct  the  fifth,  the  fourth  and  the  third 
centuries  B.  C.  with  a  fair  amount  of  accuracy. 

With  the  help  of  this  somewhat  unreliable  material,  we 


DOWNFALL  AND  EXILE 


247 


shall  now  try  to  tell  you  what  you  ought  to  know  if  you  are 
to  understand  the  great  spiritual  drama  which  was  to  follow 
so  soon  afterwards. 

Exile,  in  the  case  of  the  Judaean  people,  did  not  mean 
slavery. 

From  a  purely  worldly  point  of  view,  the  change  from 
Palestine  to  Mesopotamia  was  an  improvement  for  the  great 
majority  of  the  Jews.  The  Israelites,  a  century  and  a  half 
before,  had  been  taken  to  four  or  five  widely  separated  villages 
and  towns  and  had  been  lost  among  their  Babylonian  neigh¬ 
bours.  But  the  Judaean  exiles  of  the  year  586  were  allowed 
to  remain  together  and  to  settle  in  the  same  spot  which  became 
an  honest-to-goodness  Jewish  colony. 

They  were  in  reality  a  band  of  involuntary  pilgrims,  trav¬ 
elling  from  the  overcrowded  slums  of  Jerusalem  to  the  open 
spaces  of  Chebar.  They  left  the  sterile  fields  and  valleys  of  the 
old  land  of  the  Canaanites  to  find  a  new  home  among  the  highly 
irrigated  pastures  and  gardens  of  central  Babylonia. 

Nor  did  they  suffer  undue  violence  at  the  hands  of  a  foreign 
taskmaster,  as  they  had  done  in  Egypt  a  thousand  years  before. 

They  were  allowed  to  retain  their  own  leaders  and  their 
own  priests. 

Their  religious  customs  and  ceremonies  were  not  disturbed. 

They  were  permitted  to  correspond  with  those  of  their 
friends  who  had  remained  in  Palestine. 

They  were  encouraged  to  practice  the  old  arts  with  which 
they  had  been  familiar  in  Jerusalem. 

They  were  free  men  and  were  given  the  right  to  have  serv¬ 
ants  and  slaves  of  their  own.  No  profession  or  trade  was  closed 
to  them  and  soon  a  large  number  of  Jewish  names  began  to 
appear  among  the  lists  of  rich  merchants  in  the  Babylonian 
capital. 


248 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Eventually,  even  the  highest  offices  in  the  state  were  opened 
to  J ewish  ability  and  Babylonian  kings  more  than  once  begged 
for  the  favour  of  Jewish  women. 

In  short,  the  exiles  had  everything  that  can  make  men 
happy,  except  the  liberty  to  go  and  come  at  will. 

By  going  from  Jerusalem  to  Tel-Harsha,  they  had  shed 
many  of  the  ills  of  the  old  country. 

But  now,  alas,  they  suffered  from  a  new  ailment. 

It  was  called  homesickness. 

This  affliction,  ever  since  the  beginning  of  time,  has  had  a 
strange  influence  upon  the  human  soul.  It  throws  a  glowing 
light  of  happy  reminiscences  across  the  old  country.  It  kills 
with  sudden  abruptness  all  recollection  of  past  injuries  and 
former  suffering.  Inevitably  it  turns  “the  old  times”  into 
“the  good  old  times”  and  bestows  upon  the  years  spent  amidst 
the  old  surroundings  the  dignifled  name  of  “the  golden  age.” 

When  a  man  is  a  victim  of  homesickness,  he  refuses  to  see 
anything  good  in  his  new  home.  His  new  neighbours  are 
inferior  to  the  old  ones  (with  whom,  to  tell  the  truth,  he  was 
for  ever  in  open  warfare).  The  new  city  (although  ten  times 
as  large  and  twenty  times  as  brilliant  as  his  former  village) 
is  a  mean  and  miserable  hamlet.  The  new  climate  is  only  fit 
for  savages  and  barbarians. 

In  short,  everything  “old”  suddenly  becomes  “good”  while 
everything  “new”  is  just  “bad”  and  “wicked”  and  “objec¬ 
tionable.” 

A  century  afterwards,  when  the  exiles  were  given  permis¬ 
sion  to  return  to  Jerusalem,  very  few  availed  themselves  of 
this  opportunity.  But  as  long  as  they  were  in  Babylon,  the 
land  of  Palestine  was  their  lost  Paradise  and  this  attitude  is 
reflected  in  everything  they  said  or  wrote. 

Generally  speaking,  the  lives  of  the  Jews  during  this  half- 


DOWNFALL  AND  EXILE 


249 


century  of  exile  were  dull  and  uneventful.  The  exiles  went 
about  their  daily  affairs  and  they  waited. 

In  the  beginning,  they  waited  with  the  eager  hope  of  those 
who  expect  that  something  “sudden”  is  going  to  happen.  The 
words  of  doom  of  the  great  Jeremiah,  who  had  predicted  this 
terrible  disaster,  were  still  ringing  in  their  ears. 

But  Jeremiah  was  dead  and  his  place  had  never  been  quite 
filled. 

In  the  earlier  chapters,  we  have  said  a  few  words  about 
the  nature  of  the  Jewish  prophets.  Since  time  immemorial, 
they  have  been  the  moral  leaders  of  their  people.  Upon  sev¬ 
eral  occasions  they  had  been  the  concrete  expression  of  the 
national  conscience. 

But  times  were  changing.  The  Jews  no  longer  depended 
for  their  religious  instruction  upon  the  spoken  word.  They 
now  had  an  alphabet  of  their  own,  and  their  language  had 
acquired  a  formal  grammar. 

This  alphabet,  in  the  beginning,  was  rather  crude.  It  had 
no  vowels.  It  left  a  great  deal  to  the  imagination. 

The  same  can  be  said  of  the  rules  governing  the  construc¬ 
tion  of  written  sentences.  No  clear  distinction  was  made 
between  the  perfect  and  the  imperfect  tenses.  One  and  the 
same  verb  could  indicate  that  something  had  already  hap¬ 
pened  or  that  it  was  about  to  happen.  We  have  to  guess  at 
the  real  meaning  from  the  contents  of  the  sentence. 

Such  a  form  of  expression  lent  itself  very  well  to  poetry. 
Hence  the  beauty  of  so  many  of  the  psalms.  It  was  much 
less  successful  when  the  writer  had  to  deal  with  concrete  ideas 
or  tried  to  give  an  account  of  the  events  of  the  past. 

It  does  not  quite  show  us  where  prophecy  ceases  and  his¬ 
tory  begins. 

But  it  was  the  best  the  Jews  could  do  until  they  learned 


250 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


the  current  Aramaic  alphabet  of  their  neighbours,  and  with 
all  its  crudities  and  imperfections,  it  served  an  excellent 
purpose. 

It  gave  those  prophets  who  had  new  ideas  a  chance  to 
reach  all  their  fellow  Judaeans,  whether  they  lived  in  Egypt,  in 
Babylonia,  or  on  the  islands  of  the  .dSgean  Sea.  It  allowed 
them  to  bring  order  into  the  old  and  vague  forms  of  worship. 
It  made  possible  that  great  system  of  codified  religious  and 
civil  law  which  we  find  in  the  Old  Testament  and  in  the 
Talmud.  And  it  turned  the  prophet  into  something  which 
he  had  never  quite  been  before.  He  began  to  explain  the 
written  words  of  their  ancestors  to  the  children  of  the  new 
generation.  From  a  man  of  action,  he  became  a  contemplative 
sage  who  lived  and  died,  surrounded  with  books.  Now  and 
then  we  shall  still  hear  of  prophets  who  walked  among  their 
fellow  men  and  who  spoke  the  language  of  the  market-place. 
But  as  the  number  of  schools  where  prophets  were  trained 
increased,  the  influence  of  their  graduates  diminished  in  pro¬ 
portion. 

Jehovah  ceased  to  be  the  Jehovah  of  the  wind-swept  plains 
and  hills. 

He  became  a  set  of  rules  and  regulations.  He  no  longer 
spoke  to  men  amidst  the  crash  of  thunder  in  the  desert.  His 
voice  from  now  on  was  heard  in  the  solitude  of  the  library. 
And  the  prophet  became  the  rabbi — became  the  priest — ^who 
explained  and  expounded  and  interpreted  and  elucidated  and 
gradually  buried  the  spirit  of  the  Divine  Will  underneath  that 
philological  rubbish-pile  of  learned  annotations  and  criticisms 
which  grew  to  enormous  extent  as  the  ages  went  by. 

This  new  development,  however  (hke  all  similar  changes) 
did  not  come  suddenly,  and  the  period  of  exile  produced  sev¬ 
eral  men  who  compare  favourably  with  those  among  their 


DOWNFALL  AND  EXILE 


251 


predecessors  who  had  been  the  acknowledged  spiritual  leaders 
of  their  race. 

Two  prophets  stand  out  from  the  others. 

One  of  these  was  Ezekiel. 

Of  the  other  (most  unfortunately)  we  do  not  know  the 
name.  He  was  “the  evangelist  among  the  prophets.”  He 
spoke  a  new  language,  the  like  of  which  had  never  been  heard 
either  in  Israel  or  in  Judah.  His  works  you  will  find  hidden 
in  the  latter  half  of  the  twenty-third  book  of  the  Old  Testa¬ 
ment  which  is  called  Isaiah. 

This  book  contains  sixty-six  chapters.  The  first  thirty- 
nine  may  have  been  the  work  of  the  Prophet  Isaiah,  who  lived 
during  the  reigns  of  Jotham,  Ahaz  and  Hezekiah,  and  who 
predicted  the  fate  of  the  two  Jewish  nations  long  before  the 
days  of  Sennacherib  and  Nebuchadnezzar. 

But  the  last  twenty-six  chapters  are  most  evidently  the 
work  of  a  man  who  lived  several  centuries  later  and  who  used 
different  language  and  a  different  style. 

That  these  two  dissimilar  parts  have  been  put  together 
without  a  word  of  explanation  need  not  surprise  us.  The 
compilers  of  the  Old  Testament  (as  we  have  repeatedly  stated 
before)  were  not  particular  in  such  matters.  They  took  what¬ 
ever  they  liked  wherever  they  found  it  and  pasted  their  scrolls 
together  without  a  vestige  of  what  we  modern  people  call 
“editing.” 

In  this  way,  the  identity  of  the  man  who  wrote  the  second 
part  of  the  book  was  lost  in  that  of  the  prophet  of  the  first 
half.  It  does  not  matter  very  much.  As  the  “Unknown 
Author,”  the  poet  has  gained  more  fame  than  many  of  his 
contemporaries  whose  genealogies  have  been  incorporated  in 
some  very  dull  pages  of  the  Old  Testatment. 

What  makes  his  work  so  valuable  is  his  new  and  unique 


252 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


vision  of  the  power  and  character  of  Jehovah.  Jehovah,  to 
him,  is  no  longer  the  tribal  god  of  a  small  Semitic  nation.  His 
name  is  written  across  the  high  heavens  of  all  lands. 

He  is  the  ruler  of  all  men. 

Even  the  mighty  King  of  Babylonia  and  the  no  less  power¬ 
ful  King  of  Persia  (to  whom  the  Jews  looked  secretly  for 
their  ultimate  deliverance) — they  are  both  the  unwitting  serv¬ 
ants  of  the  One  God  whose  will  is  law  unto  all  men. 

This  God,  however,  is  not  a  cruel  God  who  hates  those 
who  know  him  not.  On  the  contrary,  he  offers  his  love  and  his 
compassion  even  to  those  who  live  in  darkness  and  who  have 
never  heard  His  Name. 

He  does  not  keep  himself  hidden  from  man  behind  the 
forbidding  clouds  of  his  own  perfection.  He  is  visible  to  all 
who  have  eyes  to  see.  His  words  are  clear  to  those  who  have 
ears  to  hear.  He  is  the  loving  Father  of  all  men,  the  Shepherd 
trying  to  lead  an  unwilling  flock  to  the  safe  harbour  of  peace 
and  righteousness. 

Such  language  was  far  in  advance  of  the  times. 

The  average  exile  regarded  it  with  profound  misgivings. 

This  talk  of  a  God  who  loved  all  living  things  did  not  appeal 
to  a  small  community  which  depended  for  its  existence  upon 
its  daily  hate  quite  as  much  as  upon  its  daily  bread  and  which 
prayed  incessantly  for  the  days  of  vengeance  when  Jehovah 
should  destroy  the  detestable  Babylonian  captors. 

And  eagerly  they  turned  to  other  men  who  had  been  care¬ 
fully  grounded  in  the  strict  doctrines  of  an  older  day  and  who 
believed  that  Jehovah  had  chosen  the  descendants  of  Abraham 
and  Jacob  (and  them  only)  to  be  the  instruments  of  his  divine 
will,  and  who  never  ceased  to  predict  the  day  when  all  other 
nations  should  lie  prostrate  before  the  victorious  hosts  of  the 
New  Jerusalem. 


DOWNFALL  AND  EXILE 


253 


Among  the  popular  prophets  of  the  exile,  Ezekiel  stands 
forth  with  granite  strength. 

He  was  born  in  the  old  country. 

His  father  was  a  priest  and  the  boy  grew  up  in  the  highly 
religious  atmosphere  of  Jerusalem,  where  he  undoubtedly 
listened  to  the  sermons  of  Jeremiah. 

Later,  he  too  became  a  prophet. 

He  seems  to  have  been  a  young  man  of  some  importance 
in  his  community,  for  he  was  among  the  first  to  be  driven 
away  from  the  capital  as  soon  as  the  Babylonians  conquered 
Judah  and  several  years  before  the  beginning  of  the  great 
exile. 

News  of  the  actual  fall  of  Jerusalem  reached  him  in  the 
village  of  Tel-Abib  (on  the  southern  bank  of  the  Euphrates), 
where  he  made  his  home. 

He  continued  to  live  there  until  the  day  of  his  death. 

The  literary  quality  of  his  work  is  far  beneath  that  of  the 
Unknown  Author  of  Isaiah.  His  style  is  rigid.  The  man 
himself  lacks  those  human  qualities  which  make  such  an  appeal 
to  us  in  many  of  the  older  leaders.  He  is  far  from  modest. 

He  often  gets  into  a  veritable  trance  of  artificial  excite¬ 
ment.  Upon  such  occasions  he  sees  strange  visions  and  hears 
mysterious  voices. 

But  withal  he  was  a  man  with  a  good  deal  of  practical  sense. 

Like  Jeremiah,  he  never  ceased  to  argue  against  those  mis¬ 
guided  fanatics  who  believed  that  Jerusalem  was  bound  to  be 
impregnable  because  the  town  happened  to  be  the  capital  of 
God’s  Chosen  People. 

He  warned  them.  He  told  them  that  faith  without  deeds 
had  never  saved  a  nation. 

But  when  the  city  had  been  taken  and  many  people  of 
little  faith  became  at  once  despondent  about  the  future  of  their 


254  THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

race,  Ezekiel  stood  forth  as  the  triumphant  advocate  of  a  better 
future. 

He  never  ceased  to  predict  the  happy  day  when  the  Temple 
should  he  restored  and  the  altar  of  Jehovah  drip  once  more 
with  the  blood  of  the  oflPered  bullocks. 

This  resurrected  state,  however  (according  to  his  views), 
could  not  survive  unless  the  Jewish  nation  was  willing  to  sub¬ 
mit  to  certain  practical  reforms  which  Ezekiel  then  described 
in  great  detail. 

Here,  for  a  moment,  he  assumed  the  role  of  his  Greek 
neighbour,  Plato. 

He  gave  us  the  description  of  an  Ideal  State,  according  to 
his  own  views  of  life.  He  wanted  to  strengthen  and  reenforce 
those  parts  of  the  Laws  of  Moses  which  in  former  times  had 
given  several  heathenish  forms  of  worship  a  chance  to  incor¬ 
porate  themselves  within  the  holy  rites  of  Jehovah. 

In  a  general  way,  he  advocated  the  reestablishment  of  the 
Kingdom  of  David  and  of  Solomon. 

But  in  his  new  state,  the  Temple  and  not  the  royal  palace 
must  become  the  centre  of  all  national  life  and  activity. 

The  Temple,  according  to  the  Prophet,  was  the  House  of 
Jehovah,  and  the  palace  was  merely  the  home  of  the  sovereign. 

That  difference  ought  to  be  severely  impressed  upon  the 

people. 

Furthermore,  the  average  man  should  have  a  profound 
respect  for  the  holiness  of  his  God  and  should  be  made  to 
understand  that  He  was  a  Being  far  removed  from  ordinary 
human  traffic. 

The  Temple,  therefore,  in  EzekieFs  ideal  state,  was  to  be 
surrounded  by  two  enormous  walls  and  should  stand  in  the 
middle  of  vast  courtyards,  so  that  the  gaping  multitude  could 
at  all  times  be  kept  at  a  respectable  distance. 


DOWNFALL  AND  EXILE 


255 


Everything  connected  with  the  Temple  was  to  be  holy 
ground. 

No  foreigner  was  ever  to  be  allowed  within  the  enclosure. 

And  the  Jews,  with  the  exception  of  the  priests,  were  to 
be  admitted  only  on  rare  occasions. 

The  priests  were  to  form  a  closely  knit  union  or  guild. 

Only  descendants  of  Zadok  should  aspire  to  this  dignity. 

Their  influence  was  to  be  greatly  increased  until  they 
should  be  the  actual  rulers  of  the  state,  as  it  had  already  been 
planned  by  Moses. 

In  order  to  strengthen  their  hold  upon  the  common  people, 
the  number  of  feast  days  was  to  be  greatly  increased  and  spe¬ 
cial  attention  was  to  be  paid  to  the  offerings  of  atonement 
for  sin. 

The  idea  of  perpetual  sin  was  to  be  held  firmly  before  the 
nation. 

Private  offerings  were  to  be  discouraged. 

Everything  connected  with  worship  in  the  Holy  of  Holies 
ought  to  be  done  in  the  name  of  the  whole  people. 

The  King,  upon  such  occasions,  was  to  act  as  the  repre¬ 
sentative  of  the  nation. 

For  the  rest,  he  was  to  be  merely  an  ornamental  figurehead 
without  any  actual  power. 

In  the  olden  days,  David  and  Solomon  had  been  given  the 
privilege  of  appointing  all  priests. 

This  privilege  was  to  be  taken  away  from  the  sovereign. 

The  priestly  class  was  to  become  a  self-perpetuating  body 
which  was  to  treat  the  King  as  one  of  its  servants  and  by  no 
means  as  its  master. 

Finally,  all  the  best  land  of  the  country,  in  the  neighbour¬ 
hood  of  Jerusalem,  was  to  be  given  to  the  priests  that  they 


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might  be  certain  of  a  decent  revenue,  and  there  was  to  be  no 
appeal  from  any  law  or  decree  they  might  wish  to  pass. 

Here  indeed  was  a  strange  programme. 

But  it  sounded  reasonable  enough  to  the  contemporaries 
t)f  Ezekiel,  And  as  soon  as  the  Temple  should  have  been 
rebuilt  and  the  exiles  allowed  to  return  to  their  old  home,  they 
intended  to  establish  such  a  rigid  ecclesiastic  state. 

That  day  was  to  come  sooner  than  most  of  the  exiles 
expected. 

Beyond  the  distant  mountains  of  the  east,  a  young  bar¬ 
barian  chieftain  was  drilling  his  horsemen.  He  was  to  be 
the  Messiah  who  delivered  the  Jewish  captives  from  their 
foreign  bondage. 

His  Persian  subjects  called  him  Kurus. 

We  know  him  by  the  name  of  Cyrus. 


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CHAPTER  XV 

MEANWHILE  A  SMALL  TRIBE  OF  PERSIAN  SHEPHERDS 
HAD  GONE  ON  THE  WARPATH  AND  HAD  DESTROYED 
THE  MIGHTY  EMPIRES  OF  WESTERN  ASIA.  CYRUS, 
THE  PERSIAN  KING,  ALLOWED  THE  JEWISH  EXILES 
TO  RETLTRN  TO  THEIR  OWN  COUNTRY.  THE  MAJORITY 
OF  THE  JEWS,  HOWEVER,  WERE  PERFECTLY  HAPPY 
IN  THE  COMFORTABLE  BABYLONIAN  CITIES  AND  RE¬ 
MAINED  WHERE  THEY  WERE.  BUT  A  SMALL  MINOR¬ 
ITY,  WHICH  TOOK  ITS  RELIGIOUS  DUTIES  SERIOUSLY, 
RETURNED  TO  THE  RUINS  OF  JERUSALEM,  REBUILT 
THE  TEMPLE  AND  MADE  IT  THE  ABSOLUTE  AND  ONLY 
CENTRE  OF  THE  WORSHIP  OF  JEHOVAH  FOR  ALL  THE 
JEWS  IN  EVERY  PART  OF  THE  WORLD 

ARLY  during  the  seventh  century 
before  the  birth  of  Christ  a  small 
Semitic  tribe,  called  the  Kaldi  (or 
Chaldeans) ,  had  left  its  desert  home  in 
Arabia  and  had  moved  northward. 

After  many  adventures  and  several 
unsuccessful  attempts  to  break  into  the 
domains  of  Assyria,  the  Kaldi  had  at 
last  made  common  cause  with  the  wild  mountain-people  who 
lived  to  the  east  of  the  Mesopotamian  plain. 

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Together  they  had  defeated  the  Assyrian  armies  and  had 
taken  and  destroyed  the  city  of  Nineveh. 

Upon  the  ruins  of  the  old  empire,  Nabopolassar,  the  chief¬ 
tain  of  the  Chaldeans,  had  then  founded  a  kingdom  of  his 
own  which  is  now  called  New  Babylonia  by  some  historians 
and  Chaldea  by  others. 

His  son,  Nebuchadnezzar,  had  greatly  strengthened  the 
boundaries  of  his  inheritance.  And  Babylon  had  become 
(what  it  had  been  three  thousand  years  before)  the  centre  of 
the  old  civilised  world. 

During  his  interminable  war  with  his  neighbours,  Nebu¬ 
chadnezzar  had  overrun  and  had  conquered  that  remnant  of 
the  old  Jewish  state  which  was  known  as  Judah,  and  he  had 
transplanted  several  colonies  of  Judaeans  (or  Jews)  from  the 
shores  of  the  Mediterranean  to  the  banks  of  the  Euphrates. 

His  relations,  however,  with  his  Jewish  subjects  were  pleas¬ 
ant  enough,  although  somewhat  indifferent. 

Like  all  stern  monarchs,  Nebuchadnezzar  took  a  great 
interest  in  fortune-telling.  The  man  who  could  successfully 
explain  a  dream  was  certain  to  find  favour  in  the  eyes  of  the 
King. 

Such  a  man,  it  seems,  was  the  prophet  Daniel. 

According  to  the  book  which  bears  his  name  (but  which 
was  written  four  hundred  years  later)  Daniel  was  a  young 
Judsean  prince  who  had  been  taken,  together  with  three  of 
his  young  cousins,  to  Babylon  that  he  might  there  be  educated 
at  the  Chaldean  court. 

The  four  boys  were  very  faithful  servants  of  J ehovah. 

They  obeyed  his  holy  laws  in  all  details. 

For  example,  when  they  were  given  the  regular  palace 
food,  they  refused  to  eat  it  and  insisted  upon  meat  and  vege¬ 
tables  which  had  been  prepared  according  to  those  ancestral 


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regulations  which  prescribed  in  detail  how  cows  and  sheep 
should  be  slaughtered  and  how  vegetables  should  be  cooked. 

Fortunately,  the  Chaldeans  were  tolerant  and  easy-going 
and  the  little  captives  were  given  whatever  they  asked  for. 

They  were  diligent  and  eager  boys. 

They  learned  all  that  the  Babylonian  schools  could  teach 
them  and  promised  to  be  useful  subjects  of  their  adopted 
country. 

Now  it  happened  during  the  last  years  of  Nebuchadnez¬ 
zar’s  reign  that  the  old  King  had  a  dream. 

He  called  his  “wise  men”  together  and  bade  them  explain 
it  to  him  on  pain  of  death.  The  “wise  men,”  quite  reasonably, 
said:  “Tell  us  the  dream,  Your  Majesty,  and  we  shall  do  our 
best  to  give  you  an  explanation.” 

“I  have  forgotten  my  dream,”  he  answered.  “But  I  know 
positively  that  I  dreamed  something  or  other.  It  is  your  busi¬ 
ness  to  tell  me  both  what  I  dreamed  and  what  it  means,” 

The  magicians  begged  for  mercy. 

They  asked  their  ruler  to  be  reasonable. 

“How  can  any  man  tell  another  that  which  the  other  does 
not  know  himself?”  they  shouted. 

Eastern  tyrants,  however,  are  not  interested  in  such  details. 

Without  further  ado,  Nebuchadnezzar  condemned  all  his 
“wise  men”  to  the  gallows. 

He  seems  to  have  been  in  a  bad  humour  on  that  particular 
day.  He  gave  orders  to  kill  not  only  these  particular  men 
who  had  failed  in  their  duty,  but  to  rid  his  court  once  for  all 
of  every  magician  and  sorcerer. 

An  officer  was  despatched  to  the  quarters  of  Daniel  and 
his  friends  that  they  might  share  the  fate  of  all  their  fellow- 
conjurors. 

But  Daniel,  who  in  many  respects  was  like  Joseph,  had 


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made  friends  with  the  military  men  at  the  Babylonian  court. 
He  asked  the  captain  of  the  guard  to  give  him  a  short  respite. 

Meanwhile,  he  would  try  to  see  what  he  could  do. 

He  laid  himself  down  to  sleep  and  immediately  Jehovah 
revealed  to  him  the  dream  which  Nebuchadnezzar  had  most 
inadvertently  lost. 

The  next  morning,  the  captain,  whose  name  was  Arioch, 
took  Daniel  before  Nebuchadnezzar.  The  King  was  still 
greatly  worried  and  was  willing  to  give  this  young  foreigner 
a  chance. 

Daniel  first  retold  the  dream,  a  strange  story  connected 
with  the  political  events  of  four  hundred  years  later. 

Then  he  explained  it. 

As  a  result  of  his  cleverness,  he  gained  the  everlasting 
gratitude  of  his  royal  master,  who  made  him  governor  of  the 
city  of  Babylon  and  who  appointed  Shadrach,  Meshach  and 
Ahednego,  his  three  companions,  to  be  the  rulers  of  three  rich 
provinces. 

All  this  was  very  pleasant  but  it  did  not  last  long.  For, 
according  to  the  unknown  author  of  these  chapters,  Nebu¬ 
chadnezzar,  in  his  dotage,  became  addicted  to  a  form  of  image- 
worship  which  was  as  foreign  to  the  taste  of  the  intelligent 
Chaldeans  as  to  that  of  the  Jews. 

He  ordered  a  large  statue  to  be  made.  It  was  ninety  feet 
high  and  nine  feet  wide  and  entirely  covered  with  gold.  It 
stood  in  the  plain  of  Dura  where  it  could  be  seen  from  far  and 
wide.  At  a  given  signal  (the  blowing  of  many  trumpets)  all 
the  people  of  the  country  were  expected  to  prostrate  them¬ 
selves  before  this  image  and  to  worship  it. 

Shadrach,  Meshach  and  Abednego,  however,  could  not  do 
this.  They  remembered  the  Second  Commandment.  They 
refused  to  obey  the  royal  edict.  All  the  people  went  down 


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261 


upon  their  faces,  but  Shadrach,  Meshach  and  Abednego  re¬ 
mained  standing  upright. 

They  knew  the  punishment  which  awaited  them. 

They  were  taken  before  Nebuchadnezzar,  who  ordered 
them  to  be  thrown  into  a  fiery  furnace.  To  make  sure  that 
the  victims  should  not  escape  their  fate,  the  furnace  was  heated 
seven  times  hotter  than  usual. 

Shadrach,  Meshach  and  Abednego  were  bound,  hand  and 
foot,  and  were  thrown  into  the  flames. 

But  behold!  when  the  doors  were  opened,  the  next  morn¬ 
ing,  the  three  young  men  walked  out  as  unconcernedly  as  if 
they  were  just  returning  from  a  cool  swim. 

After  that,  Nebuchadnezzar  was  convinced  that  Jehovah 
was  the  greatest  of  all  gods.  He  forgot  his  idols  and  favoured 
his  Jewish  captors  more  than  ever  before. 

Unfortunately,  he  was  soon  afterwards  stricken  with  a 
strange  nervous  malady. 

He  imagined  that  he  had  become  an  animal.  He  went 
around  on  all  fours  and  mooed,  and  died  miserably  in  a  field, 
where  he  had  been  eating  grass,  like  an  ordinary  cow. 

In  all  this,  we  are  following  the  text  of  the  book  ascribed 
to  the  hand  of  Daniel.  This  volume,  according  to  the  pains¬ 
taking  investigations  of  modern  scholars,  was  written  some¬ 
time  between  the  years  167  and  165  B.  C.  when  the  Jews 
were  very  lax  in  their  religious  duties.  The  author,  taking 
the  liberty  of  a  novelist,  laid  his  story  during  the  reign  of 
Nebuchadnezzar.  He  probably  introduced  the  wholly  imag¬ 
inary  episode  of  the  fiery  furnace  to  tell  his  contemporaries 
what  faith  can  do  for  those  who  seriously  believe  that  Jehovah 
is  on  their  side  and  he  made  Nebuchadnezzar  die  a  terrible 
death  because  such  an  unfortunate  ending  was  sure  to  please 
his  Jewish  readers. 


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THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


To  do  this  was  his  good  right  as  the  teacher  of  certain 
religious  morals.  But  we  have  too  many  Babylonian  sources 
about  the  great  Chaldean  King  to  be  in  doubt  about  his  ulti¬ 
mate  fate.  He  died  peacefully  in  the  year  561  B.  C.  and  six 
years  later  the  dynasty  of  Nabopolassar  came  to  an  end  and 
a  general  by  the  name  of  Nabonidus  made  himself  master  of 
the  throne. 

This  Nabonidus  seems  to  have  had  a  son  or  a  son-in-law 
by  the  name  of  Bel-shar-usur,  who  shared  the  throne  with  him. 

In  the  book  of  Daniel  he  is  called  Belshazzar  and  according 
to  the  Jewish  tradition,  he  was  the  last  king  of  Babylon.  But 
once  more  we  are  in  the  midst  of  very  conflicting  historical 
evidence.  Darius,  the  Mede,  who  is  mentioned  in  this  same 
chapter  of  the  Old  Testament,  was  probably  intended  for 
Darius  the  Persian,  who  lived  a  hundred  years  later,  and  Bel¬ 
shazzar  was  not  murdered  until  several  months  after  the  sur¬ 
render  of  Babylon  to  the  Persians. 

But  that  some  sort  of  feast  was  held  just  before  the  city 
was  surprised  by  the  enemy  is  borne  out  both  by  Herodotus 
and  Xenophon,  and  it  was  at  this  very  noisy  celebration  that 
Daniel  gained  his  greatest  fame  as  a  prophet  of  future  events. 

Belshazzar,  so  the  story  goes,  had  invited  more  than  a 
thousand  nobles  to  his  party.  They  ate  and  they  drank  and 
the  hall  was  full  of  the  noise  of  very  drunken  people.  Sud¬ 
denly,  on  the  wall  opposite  the  King’s  couch,  a  hand  appeared. 

Quietly  it  wrote  four  words  upon  the  stones. 

Then  it  disappeared. 

The  words,  curiously  enough,  were  written  in  Aramaic. 
No  wonder  that  the  King  could  not  understand  them.  He 
sent  for  his  magicians,  but  they  too  failed  to  decipher  them. 
Then  some  one  remembered  Daniel,  just  as  ten  centuries 


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263 


before,  at  the  court  of  Pharaoh,  some  one  had  remembered 
Joseph. 

Daniel  came.  He  was  well  versed  in  the  different  arts  of 
mystic  writing.  He  read  the  words  first  down,  then  up,  and 
then  down  again.  This  is  what  he  saw: 


M 

U 

P 

E 

L 

H 

N 

E 

A 

E 

K 

R 

M 

E 

S 

E 

T 

I 

N 

E 

N 

And  this  is  what  he  spelled  out:  MENE  MENE 
TEKEL  UPHARSIN. 

Even  then,  this  combination  of  letters  did  not  make  much 
sense. 

A  ‘‘mene”  or  “mina”  was  a  Jewish  coin  or  weight,  about 
fifty  times  the  value  of  a  shekel. 

A  “tekel”  was  what  we  call  a  ‘^shekel.” 

The  “u”  before  the  next  word  was  merely  a  connecting 
particle,  and  “pharsin”  (which  became  “Peres”  in  the  transla¬ 
tion)  could  mean  “half-a-mina”  or  it  could  refer  to  the  “Peres” 
or  Persians. 

Thus  the  words  could  have  meant  “Nebuchadnezzar  was  a 
mina.  Nebuchadnezzar  was  a  mina.”  (Repeated  for  the  sake 
of  strengthening  the  argument.)  “Belshazzar,  you  are  only 
a  shekel.  The  Persians  are  half  a  mina.” 

Or,  in  plain  English:  “The  big  empire  of  the  great  Nebu¬ 
chadnezzar,  now  dwindled  to  a  small  kingdom  under  your 
weak  guidance,  O  King  Belshazzar!  will  soon  be  divided  into 
halves  by  the  Persians.” 


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THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


All  this,  however,  is  a  philological  puzzle  which  we  shall 
not  try  to  solve. 

Daniel  appears  to  have  regarded  the  substantives  as  the 
past  participles  of  the  verbs  “to  count,”  “to  weigh,”  and  “to 
number.” 

And  he  gave  the  following  explanation  of  this  very  fright¬ 
ening  riddle : 

“Jehovah  has  weighed  you  in  the  balance,  O  King  Bel¬ 
shazzar,  and  he  has  found  you 
wanting.” 

As  a  reward  for  his  prophecy 
and  hoping  to  find  favour  in  the 
eyes  of  the  Jewish  God,  Bel¬ 
shazzar  made  Daniel  his  vice¬ 
roy. 

But  this  honour  meant  little. 

The  Persians  were  at  the  gates 
of  Babylon.  The  days  of  the 
empire  were  indeed  numbered. 

In  the  year  538,  Cyrus  en¬ 
tered  the  city  through  one  of  the 
water-gates. 

He  spared  Nabonidus,  the  King.  He  killed  Belshazzar 
when  the  latter,  a  short  while  later,  tried  to  start  a  revolution 
against  the  conquering  host. 

And  he  turned  the  territory  of  Babylon  into  a  Persian 
province  just  as  the  Babylonians  (only  half  a  century  before) 
had  turned  the  kingdom  of  Judah  into  a  subordinate  part  of 
their  own  empire. 

As  for  Darius  the  Mede,  who  is  mentioned  in  the  book  of 
Daniel,  we  know  nothing  about  him  except  his  name.  Cyrus, 
on  the  other  hand,  is  a  famous  hero  of  antiquity  and  he  de¬ 
serves  some  attention. 


DANIEL  DECIPHERS  THE 
MYSTERIOUS  LETTER 


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The  Persian  people  over  whom  he  ruled  were  of  Aryan 
stock.  That  is  to  say,  they  were  not  Semitic  like  the  Baby¬ 
lonians  and  the  Assyrians  and  the  Jews  and  the  Phoenicians, 
but  they  belonged  to  the  same  general  group  of  people  from 
whom  our  ancestors  are  descended.  Originally  those  tribes 
seem  to  have  lived  in  the  plains  on  the  eastern  shores  of  the 
Caspian  Sea. 

At  an  unknown  date  they  appear  to  have  left  their  old 
homestead  to  begin  a  great  trek. 

A  few  of  them  went  westward  and  settled  among  the  abo¬ 
rigines  of  Europe  whom  they  soon  killed  or  subjugated. 

Others  went  southward  and  occupied  the  plateau  of  Iran 
and  the  plains  of  India.  The  Persians,  together  with  the 
Medes,  took  hold  of  several  mountain  ranges  which  had  been 
depopulated  by  the  ferocious  military  expeditions  of  the 
Assjrrians. 

Here  they  organised  themselves  into  something  which  at 
first  resembled  a  cowboy  republic.  Out  of  these  humble  begin¬ 
nings  had  grown  that  strange  kingdom  of  Persia  which  was 
devated  to  the  rank  of  an  empire  by  the  conquests  of  Cyrus. 

Cyrus  himself  was  a  very  remarkable  man.  He  only  made 
war  when  he  could  not  accomplish  his  purpose  by  means  of 
intrigue  and  diplomacy.  He  did  not  march  against  Babylon 
until  he  had  isolated  that  powerful  city  from  all  her  former 
vassals  and  allies.  This  was  slow  work. 

It  took  almost  twenty  years,  and  this  period  had  been  one 
of  intense  excitement  for  the  exiles. 

From  the  very  beginning,  they  had  suspected  that  “Kurus” 
might  be  the  Messiah  who  at  Jehovah’s  instigation  was  to 
deliver  them  from  their  Babylonian  yoke.  They  had  followed 
his  adventures  with  breathless  interest.  First  they  had  heard 
of  him  as  making  war  upon  the  Cappadocians. 


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A  little  later,  so  travellers  had  told  them,  he  was  engaged 
in  a  struggle  with  Croesus,  King  of  the  Lydians  and  a  great 
personal  friend  of  Solon,  the  law-giver  of  the  Greeks. 

Next,  rumour  had  him  in  Asia  Minor,  where  he  was  said 
to  be  building  a  fleet  with  which  to  invade  the  shores  of  Greece. 

A  whole  chorus  of  prophets  watched  this  man’s  campaigns 
with  almost  indecent  zeal.  Whenever  there  was  a  report  of 
another  Persian  victory,  all  the  people  broke  forth  into  songs 
of  praise  and  hope. 

The  days  of  Babylon  (of  this  they  were  convinced)  were 
numbered.  The  wicked  city  had  refused  to  listen  to  the  words 
of  Jehovah. 

Jehovah  was  ready  to  punish  her  for  her  crime. 

When  at  last  the  impossible  happened  and  Babylon  fell, 
the  Jewish  captives  celebrated  the  event  with  frantic  joy. 
Then  they  rushed  forth  to  kiss  the  feet  of  their  new  masters 
and  asked  that  they  be  allowed  to  return  to  the  old  country. 

Cyrus  made  no  objection. 

He  prided  himself  upon  his  tolerance. 

All  the  subject  races  of  the  old  Babylonian  empire  were  at 
once  given  permission  to  return  to  their  homes.  Cyrus,  how¬ 
ever,  went  further. 

He  seems  to  have  had  an  almost  Roman  indifference 
towards  the  private  opinions  of  other  people. 

If  the  Jews  or  the  Phoenicians  or  the  Cilicians  preferred 
their  own  gods  to  those  of  the  Persians,  that  was  their  business. 

They  were  welcome  to  build  such  temples  as  they  thought 
best. 

They  could  All  them  with  images  or  leave  them  bare,  just 
as  they  preferred. 

Provided  they  paid  their  taxes  and  obeyed  the  King’s 
“satraps”  or  governors,  they  could  shape  their  own  political 


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and  religious  lives  as  suited  them  best,  and  the  King  would 
see  to  it  that  no  one  dared  to  interfere. 

Furthermore,  the  idea  of  a  wholesale  return  of  the  Jewish 
exiles  to  the  land  of  Canaan  had  a  practical  side  which  greatly 
appealed  to  this  sagacious  ruler.  He  hoped  to  make  Persia  a 
maritime  nation. 

The  cities  of  Phoenicia  already  obeyed  his  will. 

But  between  Phoenicia  and  Babylonia  lay  the  deserted 
ruins  of  Palestine. 

It  was  necessary  to  repopulate  this  desert. 

A  few  vague  attempts  in  this  direction  had  already  been 
made  by  the  Babylonians.  They  had  sent  immigrants  to  the 
former  kingdom  of  Israel.  These  had  settled  down  among 
the  half-starved  remnants  of  the  original  population.  To¬ 
gether  with  these,  they  had  formed  a  new  race,  called  the 
Samaritans,  remnants  of  which  may  be  found  to-day  in  some 
of  the  Palestine  villages  of  the  north. 

They  had  never  been  very  prosperous.  They  were  a 
strange  mixture,  composed  of  Hebrews  and  Babylonians  and 
Assyrians  and  Hittites  and  Phoenicians,  who  were  held  in  the 
most  profound  contempt  by  the  pure  Jews  of  the  former 
Judsean  kingdom.  When  Cyrus  began  to  restore  order  in 
Palestine,  he  first  of  all  tried  to  find  the  descendants  of  the 
captives  from  Israel.  Not  a  trace  could  be  found  of  these 
exiles  or  their  children.  They  had  been  completely  absorbed 
by  their  Babylonian  neighbours  and  their  fate  is  as  much  of 
a  mystery  to-day  as  it  was  in  the  year  538  B.  C. 

It  was  easy,  on  the  other  hand,  to  deal  with  the  Judaeans. 
They  had  maintained  their  racial  integrity. 

A  royal  edict  of  the  year  537  urged  them  to  return  at  once 
to  Jerusalem.  At  the  same  time,  it  gave  them  permission  to 
rebuild  the  temple.  It  restored  to  them  all  the  golden  and 


268 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


silver  implements  which  Nebuchadnezzar  had  taken  to  Baby¬ 
lon,  some  forty  years  before,  and  it  encouraged  the  Judseans 
to  turn  Jerusalem  into  a  new  national  capital  which  should 
rival  the  extinct  but  not  forgotten  splendour  of  Solomon’s  old 
residence. 

After  half  a  century  of  prayer,  the  words  of  the  prophet 
had  come  true. 

The  exile  of  Jehovah’s  children  had  come  to  an  end. 

The  J ews  were  at  liberty  to  leave  their  prison. 

But  now  that  the  door  stood  open,  behold !  only  a  few  of  the 
captives  availed  themselves  of  the  opportunity  to  go  home. 

The  majority  remained  quietly  in  Babylon  or  moved  to 
Ecbatana  or  to  Nippur  or  to  Susa  or  to  one  of  the  other  great 
centres  of  the  new  Persian  empire.  A  very  small  minority 
undertook  the  long  and  dangerous  journey  through  the  desert. 
They  were  pious  men  who  took  their  religious  duties  very 
seriously. 

And  they  now  estabhshed  upon  the  ruins  of  Jerusalem  a 
new  state  which,  devoid  of  all  foreign  influence,  was  to  be 
devoted  exclusively  to  the  worship  of  J ehovah. 

It  would  have  been  natural  if  Daniel  had  assumed  the  lead¬ 
ership  over  those  who  returned  to  Palestine. 

But  Daniel  was  too  old  to  travel.  The  Persians  treated 
him  kindly  and  retained  him  in  his  office.  For  a  short  time  he 
came  under  the  suspicion  of  disloyalty,  because  he  continued 
to  pray  to  Jehovah  when  the  king  had  issued  a  decree  forbid¬ 
ding  all  petitions  to  either  gods  or  men  for  the  period  of  a 
month.  As  a  result  of  this  disobedience,  he  had  been  con¬ 
demned  to  death  and  had  been  thrown  before  the  lions. 

But  these  ferocious  animals  had  refused  to  eat  so  holy  a 
prophet.  In  the  morning,  Daniel  had  walked  out  of  the  cage 


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269 


without  a  single  scratch,  and  after  that,  he  lived  his  life  in 
peace. 

When  it  became  certain  that  he  could  not  undertake  the 
journey,  the  Persians  looked  for  another  candidate  for  the 
governorship  of  the  reestablished  province  of  Judah. 

Their  choice  fell  upon  a  certain  Zerubbabel,  who  was  dis¬ 
tantly  related  to  the  old  Judasan  kings.  Zerubbabel  went  to 
Jerusalem  and  together  with  the  high  priest,  Joshua,  he  began 
the  work  of  reconstruction. 

It  was  no  easy  task.  The  entire  city  had  to  be  rebuilt. 
Most  of  the  surrounding  territory  had  been  turned  into  farms 
and  pastures  by  squatters  from  the  Samaritans’  country. 
They  of  course  hated  to  be  dispossessed  and  they  did  every¬ 
thing  they  could  to  make  the  life  of  the  newcomers  as  difficult 
and  as  unpleasant  as  possible. 

They  hoped  to  make  an  honest  penny  working  on  the 
Temple  but  they  were  informed  that  no  heathens  need  apply 
for  a  job  on  the  holy  shrine. 

To  revenge  themselves,  they  sent  mysterious  messages  to 
Cyrus,  warning  the  Persian  king  of  a  rebellion  which  was  to 
make  Judah  an  independent  kingdom  as  soon  as  the  Temple 
should  be  finished. 

Cyrus  was  a  very  busy  man.  He  had  no  time  to  bother 
about  such  trifles  as  a  Jewish  revolt,  but  as  a  precautionary 
measure,  he  gave  orders  that  the  building  of  the  Temple  should 
be  discontinued  until  the  charge  should  have  been  investigated. 

Soon  afterwards  Cyrus  died  and  the  matter  was  forgotten. 
Several  years  went  by  and  the  half-finished  walls  were  begin¬ 
ning  to  be  covered  with  weeds.  Then  the  prophet  Haggai 
appeared  upon  the  scene.  He  denounced  Zerubbabel  for  his 
indolence  and  timidity  and  told  him  to  continue  the  work  on 
the  walls  with  or  without  royal  permission. 


270 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Zerubbabel,  who  was  sadly  in  need  of  a  little  encourage¬ 
ment,  promised  that  he  would  do  so.  He  told  the  people  to 
go  back  to  work. 

But  then  he  got  into  trouble  with  Tatnai,  the  governor  of 
Samaria,  who  asked  him  by  what  right  he  was  building  this 
house  of  God  which  began  to  look  more  and  more  like  a  regular 
fortification.  Zerubbabel  answered  that  he  had  obtained  the 
permission  years  ago  from  Cyrus.  Tatnai  sent  this  answer  to 
headquarters.  Meanwhile,  Cambyses,  the  successor  of  Cyrus, 
had  also  died  and  had  been  followed  by  Darius.  Darius 
ordered  that  a  search  be  made  of  the  archives.  It  was  getting 
to  be  quite  a  complicated  case.  But  fortunately,  the  origi¬ 
nal  decree,  signed  by  Cyrus,  was  discovered. 

Tatnai  thereupon  withdrew  his  opposition  and  four  years 
later  the  Temple  was  finished. 

Slowly  a  few  other  exiles  returned  to  their  native  country. 
The  vast  majority  of  the  Jews,  however,  continued  to  live  in 
the  commercial  centres  of  Egypt  and  Babylonia  and  Persia. 
Whenever  circumstances  allowed  it,  they  celebrated  their  great 
religious  festivals  within  the  walls  of  their  holy  city.  They 
acknowledged  and  honoured  the  old  town  as  their  spiritual 
home.  But  the  little  land-locked  capital,  with  its  narrow  and 
dirty  streets  and  its  neglected  workshops,  did  not  offer  suffi¬ 
cient  opportunity  for  worldly  success. 

As  soon  as  the  last  offering  had  been  made  and  the  last 
psalm  had  been  chanted  the  visitors  hastened  back  to  the  busy 
counting  houses  of  Susa  and  Daphnse.  They  were  proud 
to  be  Jews  and  they  loved  Jerusalem,  provided  they  did  not 
have  to  live  there  all  the  year  roimd. 

In  this  way  there  developed  that  strange  double  loyalty 
which  was  to  cause  much  trouble  and  suffering  during  the  next 
four  centuries.  For  although  the  Jews,  in  the  dispersion,  lived 


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271 


peacefully  among  the  Persians  and  the  Egyptians  and  the 
Greeks  and  the  Romans,  they  never  adopted  the  customs  of 
these  countries. 

Everywhere  they  formed  a  state  within  a  state. 

They  lived  in  a  quarter  of  their  own. 

They  went  to  a  different  temple. 

They  did  not  allow  their  children  to  associate  with  the  boys 
and  girls  to  whom  Jehovah  was  just  a  funny  name.  They 
would  rather  kill  their  daughters  than  give  them  in  marriage 
to  a  heathenish  husband. 

They  ate  different  food  which  had  been  differently  pre¬ 
pared. 

They  were  careful  to  obey  the  laws  of  the  land,  but  besides 
they  obeyed  certain  very  rigid  and  complicated  laws  of  their 
own. 

By  preference  they  wore  a  garment  which  distinguished 
them  from  other  people. 

And  they  rigorously  celebrated  certain  holidays  which  were 
a  complete  mystery  to  their  fellow-citizens. 

People  are  always  suspicious  of  those  of  their  neighbours 
whom  they  fail  to  imderstand.  The  aloofness  of  these  Jewish 
colonies,  the  open  scorn  of  all  Jews  for  the  gods  of  other  races, 
together  with  their  gift  for  racial  team-work,  often  made  them 
unpopular  among  their  neighbours  and  frequently  led  to  bitter 
feuds. 

In  one  of  these,  early  during  the  fifth  century  before  the 
birth  of  Christ,  the  Jews  in  Persia  perished  and  were  for  a 
moment  in  danger  of  complete  annihilation. 

The  underlying  causes  for  this  sudden  outbreak  we  do  not 
know.  But  we  find  all  the  details  of  the  plot  in  the  book  of 
Esther. 

The  book  of  Esther,  the  last  of  the  so-called  historical  books 


272 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


of  the  Old  Testament,  like  the  book  of  Daniel,  was  written 
several  centuries  after  the  death  of  Xerxes  and  in  this  case  there 
are  no  Persian  inscriptions  to  help  us  out.  We  know  a  great 
deal  about  King  Xerxes,  who  almost  destroyed  the  new  civi¬ 
lisation  of  the  European  mainland.  He  was  both  weak  and 
worthless  and  the  story  of  his  behaviour  towards  his  wife  is 
entirely  in  keeping  with  his  general  character. 

Xerxes,  or  Ahasuerus,  as  the  Jews  called  him,  had  divorced 
his  wife  after  a  most  disgraceful  quarrel.  The  King  had  been 
drinking  too  much.  So,  for  that  matter,  had  the  Queen.  There 
had  been  hot  words  and  Vashti,  the  wife,  had  been  forced  to 
leave  the  royal  palace. 

Xerxes  had  immediately  searched  the  country  for  a  new 
queen  and  he  had  selected  Esther,  a  young  Jewish  girl  who 
was  an  orphan  and  who  lived  with  her  cousin  Mordecai,  a  man 
of  considerable  standing  in  the  community  and  favourably 
known  at  the  royal  court. 

Esther  went  to  live  in  the  royal  harem  and  Mordecai  often 
visited  her  there. 

One  day,  in  an  anteroom,  he  overheard  two  men  discussing 
a  plot  to  kill  the  King.  Mordecai  warned  Esther.  Esther 
spoke  to  the  King.  The  two  men  were  arrested  and  executed, 
but  Mordecai  was  forgotten  and  received  no  reward  for  having 
saved  the  King’s  life. 

This  did  not  worry  him.  He  was  well-to-do  and  did  not 
need  any  money.  Besides,  as  the  Queen’s  former  guardian,  he 
received  a  great  many  honours  and  he  was  quite  content.  But 
his  sudden  rise  in  the  world  and  the  prominence  which  he  now 
enjoyed  brought  him  many  enemies. 

Just  then  an  Arab  by  the  name  of  Haman  was  one  of 
Xerxes’  most  trusted  ministers.  Haman  (who  belonged  to 
the  tribe  of  the  Amalekites,  the  age-old  enemies  of  the  Ju- 


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273 


dgeans)  despised  Mordecai  and  Mordecai  returned  this  senti¬ 
ment  in  a  most  cordial  fashion. 

Haman  insisted  that  Mordecai  bow  to  him  first  whenever 
they  met.  Mordecai  refused.  The  matter  was  brought  before 
the  King.  The  King  said  that  he  did  not  want  to  be  bothered. 
From  that  moment  on,  the  two  men  hated  each  other  with  a 
deadly  hatred.  It  seems  a  small  matter  about  which  to  get 
excited,  but  thirty  centuries  ago,  people  did  not  know  any 
better. 

Haman  was  a  dangerous  enemy.  He  fiUed  the  heart  of 
Xerxes  with  suspicion  against  all  descendants  of  the  former 
captives.  He  pointed  to  their  rich  houses  and  to  their  apparent 
success.  As  the  King  had  never  seen  the  slums  where  the 
greater  part  of  his  Jewish  subjects  lived,  he  believed  all  these 
stories.  Without  much  trouble,  Haman  got  his  dissolute  mon¬ 
arch  to  the  point  where  he  willingly  signed  a  royal  decree  con¬ 
demning  all  the  Jews  within  his  domains  to  death. 

Haman  was  entrusted  with  the  execution  of  this  terrible 
law.  Like  all  mean  persons,  he  proceeded  with  slow  and  delib¬ 
erate  care,  for  he  wanted  to  enjoy  his  revenge  to  the  full.  He 
threw  lots  to  see  what  month  would  be  best  for  the  wholesale 
execution  of  the  followers  of  Jehovah.  In  this  way,  the  month 
of  February  was  chosen.  This  gave  Haman  enough  time  to 
order  the  erection  of  a  gallows  on  the  top  of  a  high  hill,  so 
that  Mordecai,  his  enemy,  “might  be  elevated  above  all  men.” 

The  plot,  however,  was  so  complicated  that  it  could  not 
remain  a  secret  for  very  long.  Esther,  at  Mordecai’s  urgent 
request,  appeared  unannounced  in  the  presence  of  her  royal 
husband  and  asked  that  her  people  be  spared. 

Xerxes  was  angry  at  first,  but  he  remembered  how  Mor¬ 
decai  had  once  saved  his  life,  and  putting  all  evidence  before 
him  together,  he  began  to  understand  how  Haman  had  misled 


274 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


him  out  of  personal  spite.  Messengers  on  horseback  were  sent 
at  once  to  all  parts  of  the  country  to  warn  the  Jews  against 
the  coming  attack.  And  Haman  was  impaled  on  the  top  of 
that  same  high  hill  where  he  had  hoped  to  hang  his  enemy, 
Mordecai. 

When  the  details  of  the  plot 
became  known,  the  Jews  began 
to  appreciate  the  danger  from 
which  they  had  escaped.  They 
decided  to  perpetuate  the  mem¬ 
ory  of  this  important  event. 

Every  year  thereafter,  be¬ 
tween  the  13th  and  the  15th  of 
the  month  of  Adar  (a  Baby¬ 
lonian  month  covering  part  of 
our  February  and  March) ,  there 
was  to  be  a  great  celebration 
called  the  feast  of  the  Lots  or 
‘Turim.’’ 

Upon  that  occasion,  the  book 
of  Esther  was  to  be  read  aloud  to  every  Jewish  community  and 
the  name  of  Haman  was  to  be  publicly  execrated.  And  the 
rich  were  to  give  liberally  to  the  poor  in  memory  of  the  good 
Queen  who  had  saved  her  people  from  destruction. 

The  faithful  Jews  who  had  already  returned  to  Jerusalem 
did  not  welcome  this  innovation  and  for  a  long  time  they 
opposed  the  annual  celebration  of  Purim,  which  seemed  a  little 
bit  too  “foreign.”  But  the  feast  (which  probably  was  of  As¬ 
syrian  or  Babylonian  origin,  and  very  old)  rapidly  gained  in 
popularity  in  its  new  form  and  it  has  survived  imtil  our  own 
time. 

The  story  of  Esther  shows  clearly  how  very  important  the 
foreign  colonies  were  during  the  rule  of  the  Persian  kings. 


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275 


They  completely  overshadowed  the  home  country  and  all 
accounts  seem  to  agree  upon  the  desolate  state  of  affairs  in 
Jerusalem. 

The  Temple  had  been  rebuilt  after  a  fashion.  But  the  walls 
of  the  city  were  still  in  ruins  and  commerce  and  trade  were 
slow  to  revive.  Zerubbabel  had  died  and  had  been  succeeded 
by  a  number  of  men  who,  hampered  by  a  lack  of  funds  and 
a  lack  of  immigrants,  had  not 
been  able  to  do  anything  to  im¬ 
prove  matters. 

At  last  the  Jews  abroad  de¬ 
cided  that  something  must  be 
done  for  the  old  homeland.  A 
priest  by  the  name  of  Ezra  was 
given  a  sum  of  money  to  go  to 
Judah  and  report  upon  condi¬ 
tions  there.  He  asked  for  vol¬ 
unteers  to  accompany  him. 

There  was  little  enthusiasm. 

After  a  great  deal  of  argument, 

Ezra  persuaded  some  five  hun¬ 
dred  people  to  go  back  with  him. 

After  a  journey  of  four  months,  this  band  of  pilgrims  came 
within  sight  of  the  ancient  Temple. 

But  conditions  in  Jerusalem,  as  Ezra  found,  them,  were 
terrible.  The  colonists  (for  they  were  little  else)  had  taken 
wives  from  among  the  neighbouring  villages. 

They  had  become  very  lax  in  the  execution  of  their  religious 
duties. 

Judah  was  in  a  fair  way  to  become  another  Samaria. 

Ezra,  ably  assisted  by  Nehemiah  (one  of  Artaxerxes" 
former  body  servants),  came  to  the  rescue  and  reorganised 


HAMAN  HANGED  ON  HIS 
OWN  GALLOWS 


276 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


the  decaying  state.  The  walls  of  the  city  were  at  last  rebuilt. 
The  streets  were  cleared  of  all  rubbish.  The  foreign  wives 
were  sent  back  to  their  parents.  And  outside  the  main  gate 
of  the  Temple  a  wooden  pulpit  was  built  from  which  Ezra 
regularly  read  and  explained  certain  parts  of  the  holy  laws 

that  the  people  might  forever  be 
reminded  of  their  duties. 

Even  then  the  larger  part  of 
the  old  city  remained  an  unin¬ 
habited  wilderness. 

As  this  meant  constant  dan¬ 
ger  (there  were  hardly  men 
enough  to  defend  the  elaborate 
system  of  walls  which  had  been 
laid  out  in  the  populous  days  of 
Solomon) ,  some  drastic  steps 
were  taken  to  complete  the  quota 
of  necessary  inhabitants. 

One-tenth  of  all  the  Jews 
living  in  the  adjoining  country  districts,  selected  by  lot,  were 
told  that  they  must  move  into  Jerusalem.  A  few  came  volun¬ 
tarily  and  were  given  great  honour  as  very  unselfish  patriots. 
The  others  were  brought  in  by  force. 

Even  then,  Jerusalem  remained  a  shadow  of  her  former 
self.  The  old  days  of  political  and  commercial  importance 
were  gone  and  they  were  gone  for  good. 

The  dream  of  Ezekiel  could  never  come  true. 

But  soon  the  city  was  to  be  the  home  of  that  great  prophet 
whose  ultimate  appearance  had  been  predicted  by  that  “un¬ 
known  author”  whose  courageous  eyes  had  dared  to  look  for¬ 
ward  when  all  of  his  fellow-exiles  placed  their  faith  in  the 
glories  of  the  past. 


THE  JEWS  IN  EXILE 


THE  MISCELLANEOUS  BOOKS 


CHAPTER  XVI 

THE  MISCELLANEOUS  BOOKS  OF  THE  OLD  TESTAMENT 

HE  Old  Testament  was  a  national  Jew¬ 
ish  scrap-book.  It  contained  histories 
and  legends  and  genealogies  and  love 
poems  and  psalms,  classified  and  ar¬ 
ranged  and  reclassified  and  rearranged 
without  any  regard  for  chronological 
order  or  literary  perfection. 

Suppose  that  there  had  been  no 
American  histories  at  all  and  that  a  patriotic  citizen  of  the  year 
2923  should  decide  to  compile  such  a  volume.  Very  hkely  he 
would  go  through  all  the  bound  copies  of  our  great  magazines 
and  newspapers  (if  any  survived)  gathering  everything  of  an 
historical  and  literary  nature  that  seemed  to  be  of  sufficient 
importance. 

But  unless  he  were  very  thoroughly  prepared  for  his  task, 
he  would  give  us  a  compilation  that  would  in  many  respects 
resemble  the  Old  Testament. 

There  would  he  strange  legends  of  some  of  the  earliest 
Indians,  dealing  with  their  mysterious  stories  of  creation. 

277 


278 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


There  would  be  special  Sunday  stories,  telling  of  the  discov¬ 
eries  of  Columbus  and  giving  an  account  of  the  hardships  of 
the  first  settlers  along  the  banks  of  the  Charles  River  and  the 
Hudson. 

These  would  be  followed  by  a  detailed  description  of  the 
attempts  to  organise  the  thirteen  little  colonies  (corresponding 
to  the  twelve  tribes  of  the  Jews)  into  a  single  nation,  for  which 
there  would  be  a  great  deal  of  material. 

The  adventures  of  this  new  commonwealth  would  be  de¬ 
scribed  in  detail  with  special  reference  to  the  Civil  War,  which 
almost  turned  the  United  States  into  another  Judah  and  Israel. 

Together  with  these  historical  narratives,  there  would  be 
a  miscellaneous  collection  of  bits  of  poetry  and  of  those  songs 
that  have  become  part  of  our  great  national  inheritance. 

And  if  our  American  patriot  had  had  as  little  training  for 
this  sort  of  work  as  did  the  scribes  of  Jerusalem  and  of  Baby¬ 
lon,  we  should  find  that  those  chapters  dealing  with  the  con¬ 
quest  of  the  west  contained  snatches  of  verse,  gathered  from 
the  works  of  Longfellow,  Whittier  and  Emerson;  that  an  ac¬ 
count  of  the  Revolution  had  been  added  to  the  chapter  dealing 
with  the  acquisition  of  Alaska;  and  that  Roosevelt  was  men¬ 
tioned  as  the  author  of  almost  every  important  measure  of 
state. 

Of  course,  this  purely  imaginary  book  would  not  be  a  very 
reliable  historical  guide.  In  our  day  and  age,  that  would  not 
matter  very  much.  We  could  go  to  France  and  England  and 
Spain  and  with  the  help  of  their  libraries  (taking  it  for  granted 
that  they  had  not  been  destroyed,  as  most  of  the  libraries  of 
Babylon  have  been)  we  could  easily  enough  reconstruct  our 
own  past  from  these  foreign  sources. 

In  the  case  of  the  Old  Testament,  this  is  almost  impossible. 
The  Egyptians  and  Assyrians  and  Chaldeans  and  Persians 


THE  MISCELLANEOUS  BOOKS 


279 


paid  very  little  attention  to  this  strangely  pious  tribe,  who  held 
themselves  aloof  from  the  national  life  of  their  adopted  father- 
land. 

In  the  main,  therefore,  we  depend  for  our  information  ex¬ 
clusively  upon  the  ancient  Hebrew  and  Aramean  texts.  We 
have  said  this  before,  but  we  repeat  it  here  for  the  last  time, 
that  you  shall  not  miss  this  most  important  point. 

Thus  far  we  have,  to  the  best  of  our  ability,  tried  to  recon¬ 
struct  the  era  of  legend  and  the  period  of  written  history.  Now 
we  must  tell  you  something  about  those  extra  chapters  of  pure 
poetry  which  form  the  most  attractive  part  of  all  J ewish  litera¬ 
ture. 

The  story  of  Ruth  has  already  been  mentioned.  A  counter¬ 
part  (but  of  a  very  different  nature)  of  this  idyllic  life  of  the 
old  Judean  villages  is  found  in  the  book  of  Job. 

It  was  an  old,  old  popular  story  of  a  pious  man  who  was 
sorely  tried  by  circumstances,  but  who  never  lost  his  faith  in 
the  ultimate  good  of  all  things.  He  does  not  understand  why 
all  these  terrible  things  should  happen  to  him,  why  he  should 
be  stricken  with  a  terrible  malady,  why  he,  a  “wise  man,” 
should  not  be  allowed  to  profit  by  his  learning;  why  he,  the 
kindest  of  fathers,  should  lose  all  his  children. 

He  does  not  understand,  yet  he  resigns  himself  quietly  to 
his  fate. 

He  does  not  argue. 

He  accepts. 

But  when  he  meets  three  of  his  old  friends,  then  occurs  that 
memorable  conversation  which  has  made  the  book  of  Job  so 
dear  to  all  lovers  of  imaginary  literature. 

Job  steadfastly  maintains  that  all  his  sufferings  are  for 
the  benefit  of  his  unworthy  soul.  He  may  not  be  able  to  follow 


280 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


the  designs  of  Jehovah,  but  surely  they  are  right,  while  he  him¬ 
self,  in  his  ignorance,  is  wrong. 

At  last  the  days  of  his  trial  come  to  an  end.  Job  is  restored 
to  the  full  possession  of  his  former  riches.  He  marries  again 
and  has  seven  stalwart  sons  and  three  beautiful  daughters. 
And  he  lives  to  be  a  hundred-and-forty  years  old  and  dies,  the 
most  prosperous  and  important  man  in  the  country. 

The  book  of  Job  is  followed  by  the  Psalms. 

The  Greek  word  “psalter”  meant  a  stringed  instrument, 
probably  of  Phoenician  origin  and  at  one  time  very  popular 
in  western  Asia.  It  was  used  on  festive  occasions  to  accom¬ 
pany  the  people  who  chanted  the  holy  songs,  and  it  was  played 
with  a  plectrum,  like  a  modern  mandolin. 

It  did  not  have  a  very  wide  range  and  was  restricted  to  ten 
notes.  But  it  served  a  good  purpose. 

It  kept  the  congregation  on  the  right  pitch,  like  a  modern 
organ. 

As  for  the  Psalms,  they  are  as  varied  in  subject  as  the 
poems  of  the  last  six  centuries,  which  we  find  in  “The  Oxford 
Book  of  English  Verse.” 

They  range  all  the  way  from  the  sublime  in  goodness  to 
the  sublime  in  wickedness  and  revenge.  They  contain  the 
oldest  and  the  most  beautiful  descriptions  of  nature  of  which 
we  have  been  able  to  find  a  written  record.  Whatever  truly 
religious  people  have  ever  felt  or  dreamed  or  prayed  for  is 
contained  in  many  of  those  sublime  lines  which  speak  of  hope 
and  consolation.  The  Psalms  cover  almost  the  entire  period 
of  Jewish  national  life.  Some  were  written  during  the  days 
of  the  kingdom.  Others  date  back  only  to  the  great  exile.  As 
time  went  on,  they  became  a  regular  part  of  all  religious  cele¬ 
brations.  As  such,  they  have  been  adopted  by  our  Christian 
Church.  They  have  inspired  most  of  the  great  poets  of  later 


THE  MISCELLANEOUS  BOOKS  281 

ages.  They  have  been  translated  into  every  known  tongue. 
They  have  been  set  to  music  by  the  greatest  of  our  western 
composers.  Their  sombre  dignity  reveals  itself  even  when  we 
are  ignorant  of  the  language  in  which  they  are  read. 

Whatever  the  future  of  many  of  the  historical  and  pro¬ 
phetic  books  of  the  Old  Testament,  the  Psalms  will  survive 
as  long  as  man  believes  that  beauty  (in  whatever  form  or 
guise)  is  something  holy  and  venerable. 

The  same  cannot  be  said  of  Proverbs. 

This  is  a  book  without  any  vision  or  passion. 

It  contains  just  what  the  name  implies,  the  wise  sayings  of 
several  generations  of  shrewd  old  men  and  old  women. 

Every  nation,  since  the  beginning  of  time,  has  possessed 
such  a  collection  of  proverbs.  Our  own  republic,  based  solidly 
upon  the  common-sense  of  our  independent  pioneers,  has  given 
the  world  a  large  number  of  such  proverbs. 

The  wisdom  of  Confucius,  the  great  teacher  of  the  Chinese, 
is  almost  entirely  composed  of  such  mildly  tolerant  observa¬ 
tions  upon  the  foolishness  of  man  and  upon  the  patience  of 
the  gods.  And  just  as  to-day,  we  ascribe  the  kindly  sayings  of 
two  entire  generations  to  Abraham  Lincoln,  so  the  Jews  of 
the  Persian  period,  remembering  Solomon  as  the  greatest  of 
their  national  heroes,  proclaimed  him  the  author  of  all  this 
homely  wisdom. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  most  of  the  Proverbs  were  written 
four  hundred  years  after  the  death  of  that  great  monarch. 
This,  of  course,  is  of  very  small  importance.  The  Proverbs 
would  be  just  as  good  if  they  had  been  collected  only  yesterday. 
They  show  us  what  the  man  in  the  street  thought  and  they 
t  teach  us  more  about  the  ancient  Jewish  point  of  view  than  a 
dozen  historical  or  prophetic  works. 


282 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


The  next  chapter,  called  Ecclesiastes,  or  ‘‘the  Preacher,” 
is  a  purely  religious  volume. 

It  is  a  tired  but  a  very  human  book. 

It  delves  deeply  into  the  problems  of  life  and  faith. 

It  reflects  the  weary  and  rather  personal  wisdom  of  the 
famous  Jewish  physician  who  is  said  to  be  its  author. 

What  is  the  use,  so  he  asks,  of  those  seventy  years  of  toil 
and  anxiety,  which  represent  the  average  human  life?  The 
end  of  all  things  is  the  grave. 

The  good  die. 

The  wicked  die. 

They  all  die. 

What  does  it  all  mean?  The  righteous  suffer  persecution. 
The  ungodly  gather  riches.  Is  there  no  reason  in  this  human 
misery? 

“Vanity  of  vanities,  all  is  vanity.”  And  so  on  for  twelve 
whole  chapters. 

The  Jews,  like  all  Oriental  people,  were  a  moody  race. 

They  dwelt  upon  the  highest  peaks  of  joy  or  miserably 
they  descended  into  a  deepest  abyss  of  gloom. 

Their  literature  was  their  music. 

When  they  were  sad  and  despondent,  they  listened  to 
Ecclesiastes — ^which  has  the  despondent  beauty  of  an  Etude 
by  Chopin. 

When  they  were  happy,  they  read  the  jubilant  Psalms 
which  are  reflected  so  well  in  the  opening  chords  of  Haydn’s 
“Ode  to  Creation.” 

Man  changes,  but  his  soul  remains  the  same.  If  we  are 
wise,  we  too  shall  find  much  consolation  in  these  books  of 
poetry.  What  we  suffer,  others  have  suffered  before  us  and 
still  others  will  suffer  in  the  years  that  are  to  come. 

What  has  given  new  hope  to  those  who  died  a  thousand 


THE  MISCELLANEOUS  BOOKS  283 

years  ago  may  some  day  give  fresh  courage  to  those  who  are 
not  yet  born. 

Man  changes,  but  his  grief  and  his  pleasure  remain  as  they 
were  in  the  days  of  Abraham  and  Jacob. 

The  last  one  of  the  miscellaneous  works  of  the  Old  Testa¬ 
ment  is  a  very  curious  book.  It  is  called  the  Song  of  Songs. 
This  does  not  mean  that  it  is  really  a  collection  of  songs.  The 
repetition  of  the  word  is  used  to  indicate  a  superlative  of  liter¬ 
ary  perfection.  It  means,  “This  is  the  most  beautiful  song  of 
all  songs,”  just  as  we  praise  the  happiest  day  of  our  lives  as 
“the  day  of  days.” 

The  Song  of  Songs  is  in  reality  a  very  old  love  poem.  Of 
course.  King  Solomon  (as  seems  almost  inevitable  in  view  of 
his  tremendous  reputation)  is  said  to  be  the  author.  At  any 
rate,  he  is  the  traditional  hero  of  this  great  lyric  of  love. 

The  heroine  is  a  shepherdess. 

The  King  has  seen  her  and  has  taken  her  away  from  her 
home  in  the  village  of  Shunem. 

He  has  given  her  an  honoured  place  in  his  harem. 

He  tries  to  gain  her  favour. 

But  she,  the  simple  Shulamite,  remains  faithful  to  her  shep¬ 
herd  lover.  She  has  been  installed  in  a  lovely  apartment  in 
the  heart  of  the  royal  palace.  But  she  thinks  only  of  the  happy 
days  when  she  and  her  own  man  wandered  across  the  hills  and 
tended  their  flocks. 

She  repeats  old  bits  of  their  conversation.  At  night,  she 
dreams  of  the  strength  and  comfort  of  his  arms.  Finally  (as 
in  all  such  stories)  the  true  lovers  are  united  and  all  ends 
happily. 

The  Song  of  Songs  is  not  a  religious  book,  but  it  is  the  first 
evidence  of  something  new  and  very  fine  which  had  at  last 
come  into  the  world. 


284 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


In  the  beginning  of  time,  woman  had  been  a  beast  of 
burden. 

She  belonged  to  the  man  who  captured  her. 

She  worked  his  fields.  She  looked  after  his  cattle.  She 
bore  his  children.  She  cooked  for  him.  She  made  him  com¬ 
fortable.  And  in  return,  she  received  the  morsels  which  fell 
from  his  table. 

But  all  this  is  beginning  to  change. 

Woman  is  coming  into  her  own. 

She  is  recognised  as  the  equal  of  man. 

She  is  his  companion. 

She  inspires  his  love  and  she  receives  it. 

Upon  this  firm  foundation  of  mutual  respect  and  affec¬ 
tion,  a  new  world  was  soon  to  be  built. 


THE  COMING  OF  THE  GREEKS 


CHAPTER  XVII 

BUT  WHILE  THESE  EVENTS  OF  WHICH  WE  HAVE  JUST 
SPOKEN  WERE  TAKING  PLACE,  A  GREAT  CHANGE  HAD 
COME  OVER  THE  WORLD.  THE  GENIUS  OF  THE 
GREEKS  HAD  SET  THE  WORLD  FREE  FROM  ITS  AN¬ 
CIENT  IGNORANCE  AND  SUPERSTITION.  THE  FOUN¬ 
DATION  HAD  BEEN  LAID  FOR  OUR  MODERN  WORLD 
OF  SCIENCE  AND  ART  AND  PHILOSOPHY  AND  STATE¬ 
CRAFT 

AR  to  the  east,  where  the  purple  sails 
of  the  Phoenician  ships  disappeared 
beyond  the  distant  horizon,  lay  the 
rugged  peninsula  of  Greece. 

It  was  a  small  country,  not  quite  as 
tiny  as  the  modern  state  of  Delaware, 
and  not  quite  as  large  as  South  Caro¬ 
lina.  But  it  was  inhabited  by  a  race  of 
people  who  were  to  play  a  most  remarkable  role  in  the  history 
of  mankind. 

The  Greeks,  like  the  Jews,  were  immigrants. 

While  Abraham  was  driving  his  flocks  westward  in  search 

285 


286 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


of  new  pastures,  the  advance-guard  of  the  Greek  army  was 
exploring  the  northern  slopes  of  Mount  Olympus. 

The  problem  before  the  Greeks  was  not  as  difficult  as  that 
which  Moses  and  J oshua  encountered  when  they  tried  to  get 
a  foothold  in  the  land  of  Canaan. 

The  Pelasgians,  the  original  inhabitants  of  the  Peloponne¬ 
sian  and  Attican  valleys,  were  weak  and  uncivilised  and  had 
not  yet  outgrown  the  habits  of  the  late  stone  age.  They  were 
conquered  and  exterminated  without  great  difficulty  by  an 
enemy  armed  with  iron  spears. 

As  soon  as  this  had  been  done,  the  Greeks  settled  down 
behind  the  high  walls  of  their  little  cities  and  laid  the  founda¬ 
tions  for  that  civilisation  which  since  then  has  become  the 
common  possession  of  all  the  nations  of  Europe  and  America. 

In  the  beginning,  the  Greeks  did  not  pay  much  attention 
to  their  neighbours  across  the  sea.  They  conquered  the  ^gean 
Islands,  but  they  did  not  try  to  get  a  foothold  in  Asia.  The 
Phoenicians  maintained  their  hold  upon  foreign  commerce  and 
the  Greeks  rarely  ventured  beyond  Cape  Males  or  the  Straits 
of  the  Dardanelles. 

There  was  the  memorable  exception  when  the  Greek  con¬ 
temporaries  of  Jephthah  and  Samson  started  upon  their  famous 
expedition  against  Troy.  But  when  the  insult  to  Menelaus 
had  been  avenged,  the  Greeks  returned  to  their  own  country 
and  rarely  ventured  beyond  the  distant  harbours  of  Pergamum 
and  Halicarnassus.  What  lay  hidden  behind  the  blue  moun¬ 
tain-ridges  of  Phrygia  did  not  interest  them.  Babylon  was 
only  a  name  to  the  citizens  of  Athens.  Nineveh  was  of  small 
interest  to  the  Puritan  soldiers  of  Sparta.  They  spoke  of  these 
mysterious  cities  as  our  own  grandfathers  spoke  of  Timbuktu 
And  Lassa. 

The  land  of  Canaan  was  unknown  territory  to  them. 


THE  COMING  OF  THE  GREEKS 


287 


They  had  never  heard  of  the  Jews. 

But  in  the  fifth  century  before  the  birth  of  Christ,  all  this 
changed. 

Europe  did  not  come  to  Asia,  but  Asia  tried  to  come  to 
Europe. 

And  in  this  unholy  endeavour,  Asia  almost  succeeded. 

We  have  heard  the  name  of  Cyrus  before.  To  the  Jews 
in  their  captivity,  he  came  as  the  deliverer,  who  was  to  restore 
the  glories  of  the  old  temple. 

The  Greeks  had  reason  to  regard  him  in  a  somewhat  differ¬ 
ent  light. 

Cyrus  himself  was  too  busy  consolidating  his  empire  to 
march  far  beyond  the  plains  of  Mesopotamia.  But  eight  years 
after  his  death,  Darius,  the  son  of  Hystaspes,  came  to  the 
throne  and  there  was  an  end  to  the  peace  of  Hellas. 

The  Persian  army  (after  a  long  period  of  preparation) 
crossed  the  Hellespont  and  conquered  Thrace.  That  hap¬ 
pened  in  the  year  492  B.C.  The  expedition  met  with  disaster 
near  Mount  Athos,  a  defeat  which  the  Greeks  attributed  to 
the  timely  interference  of  their  great  god  Zeus. 

Two  years  later,  the  Persians  returned. 

At  Marathon,  they  were  brought  to  a  standstill. 

Twice  thereafter  they  repeated  the  experiment.  But  al¬ 
though  they  defeated  and  destroyed  a  Greek  force  near  the 
Thermopylae  and  plundered  and  burned  Athens,  they  never 
gained  a  lasting  foothold  on  the  western  continent. 

It  was  the  first  clash  between  the  old  civilisation  of  Asia 
and  the  young  civilisation  of  Europe,  and  Europe  remained 
victorious. 

As  for  the  Greeks,  the  triumph  of  their  arms  was  followed 
by  a  period  of  unparalleled  mental  and  artistic  development. 

Within  a  single  century  they  produced  more  scientists, 


288 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


THE  WORLD  OF  THE  GREEKS 


more  sculptors,  more  mathematicians  and  physicians  and  phi¬ 
losophers  and  poets  and  dramatists  and  architects  and  orators 
and  statesmen  and  law-givers  than  have  graced  the  annals  of 
any  other  country  during  the  last  twenty  centuries. 


THE  COMING  OF  THE  GREEKS  289 

Athens  became  the  centre  of  the  entire  civilised  world. 

From  far  and  wide,  people  travelled  to  Attica  to  study 
the  graces  of  the  body  and  the  subtleties  of  the  mind. 

Among  the  crowds  which  gathered  at  the  foot  of  the  Acrop¬ 
olis  there  may  have  been  a  few 
Jews. 

But  we  have  reason  to  doubt 
this. 

Jerusalem  never  heard  of 
the  Greek  capital,  and  those 
things  which  filled  the  western 
mind  with  eager  curiosity  were 
a  matter  of  deep  contempt  to 
the  serious  zealots  of  Palestine, 
to  whom  a  knowledge  of  the  will 
of  Jehovah  was  the  beginning 
and  the  end  of  all  things. 

They  did  not  know  and  they  did  not  care  what  was  hap¬ 
pening  in  the  land  of  the  heathen. 

They  went  to  their  temple. 

They  listened  to  the  exhortations  of  their  priests  in  the 
newly  established  synagogues.  They  minded  their  own  busi¬ 
ness. 

And  they  lived  such  inconspicuous  lives  that  we  know 
nothing  of  their  history  during  this  period. 

Jerusalem  had  been  forgotten.  Which  is  exactly  what  the 
pious  Jews  had  prayed  for. 


JERUSALEM  STOOD  FOR¬ 
GOTTEN 


JUDAEA,  A  GREEK  PROVINCE 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

A  CENTURY  LATER  A  YOUNG  MACEDONIAN  CHIEFTAIN, 
TRAINED  IN  THE  BEST  GREEK  SCHOOLS,  DECIDED 
THAT  HE  MUST  BRING  THE  BLESSINGS  OF  HIS  ADOPT¬ 
ED  CIVILISATION  TO  ALL  MANKIND,  AND  CONQUERED 
ASIA.  THE  COUNTRY  OF  THE  JEWS  WAS  OVERRUN  BY 
THE  ARMIES  OF  ALEXANDER  AND  WAS  TURNED  INTO 
A  MACEDONIAN  PROVINCE.  AFTER  HIS  DEATH,  ONE 
OF  HIS  GENERALS  BY  THE  NAME  OF  PTOLEMY  MADE 
HIMSELF  KING  OF  EGYPT  AND  THE  PROVINCE  OF 
PALESTINE  WAS  ADDED  TO  HIS  POSSESSIONS 

URING  their  long  residence  in  Persia, 
the  Jews  had  made  the  acquaintance  of 
a  new  religious  system.  The  Persians 
were  the  disciples  of  a  great  religious 
teacher  whose  name  was  Zarathustra, 
or  Zoroaster. 

Zarathustra  regarded  all  life  as  a 
constant  struggle  between  Good  and 
Evil.  The  lord  of  wisdom,  called  Ormuzd,  was  forever  at  war 
with  Ahriman,  the  lord  of  ignorance  and  evil. 

This  was  a  new  idea  to  most  of  the  J ews. 

290 


291 


JUD^A,  A  GREEK  PROVINCE 

Thus  far  they  had  recognised  one  single  master  of  all  things, 
who  was  called  J ehovah.  When  things  had  gone  wrong,  when 
they  had  been  defeated  in  battle  or  suffered  from  sickness,  they 
had  invariably  attributed  such  disaster  to  the  lack  of  devotion 
of  their  own  people.  The  idea  that  sin  was  the  result  of  the 


ZARATHUSTRA 


direct  interference  of  a  malevolent  spirit  had  never  occurred 
to  them.  Even  the  serpent  in  Paradise  in  their  eyes  had  been 
less  wicked  than  Adam  and  Eve,  who  wilfully  had  disobeyed  the 
holy  commands. 

Under  the  influence  of  the  doctrines  of  Zarathustra,  the 
Jews  now  began  to  believe  in  the  existence  of  a  spirit  who  tried 
to  undo  all  the  good  accomplished  by  Jehovah. 

They  called  him  Jehovah’s  adversary,  or  Satan. 

They  feared  him  and  they  hated  him  and  in  the  year  231, 
they  were  sure  that  he  had  come  to  earth. 


292 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

A  young  pagan  prince  by  the  name  of  Alexander  destroyed 
the  remnants  of  the  Persian  armies  in  the  plains  of  Nineveh. 
Darius,  the  last  of  the  Persian  kings,  lay  murdered  by  the  side 
of  one  of  his  own  royal  highways. 

The  mighty  empire  which  had  been  such  a  good  friend  to 
the  Jewish  exiles  was  a  thing  of  the  past.  Alexander  and  his 
Greeks  were  triumphant.  It  was  a  terrible  time. 

The  end  of  the  world  seemed  to  have  come. 

Only  the  world  never  quite  ends.  There  always  is  a  ‘‘next 
chapter”  and  this  now  opened  for  the  Jews  under  very  strange 
aspects. 

Alexander  of  Macedonia  was  really  not  a  Greek.  The  true 
Greeks  regarded  him  as  a  Macedonian,  as  a  “foreigner.”  But 
he  himself,  convinced  of  his  love  for  Greek  life  and  civilisation, 
refused  to  share  this  point  of  view. 

As  a  very  young  man  he  made  himself  the  avowed  cham¬ 
pion  of  the  Greek  cause.  Thereafter  it  was  his  ambition  to 
carry  the  ideas  of  Solon  and  Pericles  to  the  four  corners  of  the 
world,  that  all  men  might  be  benefited  by  their  noble  appeal 
to  human  intelligence. 

Alexander  began  his  career  in  336. 

Thirteen  years  later  his  dead  body  lay  in  the  palace  which 
once  had  been  the  home  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  and  which  now 
was  to  have  been  the  centre  of  a  new  world  empire. 

In  the  meantime,  the  Macedonians  had  conquered  all  the 
land  from  the  river  Nile  to  the  river  Indus,  and  they  had  car¬ 
ried  the  rudiments  of  Greek  civilisation  to  all  the  nations  of 
western  Asia  and  Egypt. 

When  the  armies  of  the  great  conqueror  began  to  overrun 
the  plains  of  Syria,  the  Jews  were  faced  with  a  difficult  prob¬ 
lem. 

How  should  they  behave  towards  this  new  master?  Only 


293 


JUD^A,  A  GREEK  PROVINCE 

a  few  years  before  (in  345)  they  had  dared  to  revolt  against 
certain  atrocities  inflicted  upon  them  by  Artaxerxes,  one  of  the 
later  Syrian  kings. 

For  a  short  while,  aided  by  the  Egyptian  king,  Nectabenus, 
and  an  auxiliary  corps  of  Greeks,  they  had  been  able  to  main¬ 
tain  themselves.  This  easy  victory  had  emboldened  the  Phoeni¬ 
cians  to  follow  their  example  and  begin  a  revolution  of  their 
own.  As  a  result,  the  city  of  Sidon  had  been  burned  to  the 
ground. 

Shortly  afterwards,  Jerusalem  had  shared  a  similar  fate. 
Most  of  the  houses  had  been  destroyed. 

The  temple  had  been  desecrated  by  the  solemn  offering  of 
unclean  animals.  A  large  number  of  people  had  been  exiled 
to  Hyrcania,  a  province  on  the  southern  shore  of  the  Caspian 
Sea,  and  the  dream  of  Jewish  independence  had  gone  up  in  the 
smoke  of  their  pillaged  land. 

It  had  been  a  bitter  blow  to  Jewish  pride.  They  had  for 
years  tried  to  be  very  careful  in  their  observation  of  the  holy 
laws.  They  had  felt  convinced  that  their  exemplary  conduct 
had  gained  them  the  absolute  support  of  Jehovah  and  that 
Jerusalem  had  become  an  impregnable  fortress,  defended  by 
his  flaming  sword. 

And  now,  after  Artaxerxes  and  his  terrible  mercenaries, 
this  new  and  unknown  menace ! 

Unfortunately  (or  fortunately)  Alexander  did  not  give 
them  much  time  for  meditation. 

Hardly  had  the  news  of  the  destruction  of  Tyre  and  the 
conquest  of  Samaria  reached  them,  when  the  Jews  were  called 
upon  to  send  money  and  provisions  to  the  Macedonian  king. 

With  Gaza  in  the  hands  of  the  Greeks  and  the  road  towards 
the  sea  cut  off,  there  was  no  hope  for  escape. 

According  to  a  very  untrustworthy  tradition,  Alexander 


294 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


himself  visited  Jerusalem  and  there  dreamed  his  famous  dream 
in  which  he  was  urged  to  be  lenient  to  the  people  of  Judah. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  city  quietly  submitted  to  the  de¬ 
mands  of  the  conqueror  and  sent  him  the  gold  and  silver  for 
which  he  had  asked. 

In  return  for  this  service,  the  Jews  were  left  unmolested 
and  enjoyed  a  period  of  comparative  rest  while  all  around  them 
empires  and  kingdoms  came  tumbling  down  into  the  dust. 

A  few  years  later,  the  city  of  Alexandria  was  built  at  the 
mouth  of  the  Nile  to  take  the  place  of  the  now  extinct  Phoeni¬ 
cian  trading  stations.  The  Jews,  whose  business  ability  was 
required  by  Alexander,  were  offered  homes  in  the  northeastern 
part  of  the  town.  Many  of  them  eagerly  availed  themselves 
of  this  opportunity  to  leave  J erusalem  and  migrated  to  Egypt. 
And  the  holy  city,  deserted  by  most  of  its  energetic  citizens, 
slowly  lost  its  last  characteristics  as  a  national  capital. 

It  then  became  what  it  was  to  remain  until  to-day — ^the 
spiritual  centre  of  the  J ewish  race,  revered  by  all  and  visited 
by  few. 

The  death  of  Alexander  did  not  change  this.  The  empire 
of  the  great  Macedonian  was  divided  among  his  generals. 

One  of  these,  by  the  name  of  Ptolemy  Soter,  got  Egypt. 
In  the  year  320  B.C.  he  made  war  upon  his  former  colleague 
who  now  ruled  Syria,  of  which  the  land  of  Judah  had  become 
a  province. 

He  attacked  Jerusalem  on  the  Sabbath  and  the  Jews,  re¬ 
membering  the  fourth  commandment,  refused  to  fight  and  lost 
their  city. 

Ptolemy,  however,  treated  the  Jews  very  well.  As  a  result, 
still  more  of  them  moved  to  Egypt  and  grass  began  to  grow 
in  the  busy  streets  which  once  had  heard  the  tread  of  Solomon’s 
pikemen. 


295 


JUDJEA,  A  GREEK  PROVINCE 

The  story  of  the  next  hundred  years  is  devoid  of  all  interest. 
The  descendants  of  Alexander’s  former  lieutenants  quarrelled 
with  each  other  without  interruption.  Judah  often  changed 
hands. 


JERUSALEM  SURRENDERED  ON  ONE  SABBATH  DAY 

WITHOUT  A  FIGHT 

Finally,  during  the  second  century  before  the  birth  of 
Christ,  it  became  part  of  the  domains  of  the  family  of  the 
Seleucids. 

In  the  year  175,  Antiochus  Epiphanes,  the  eighth  ruler  of 


296 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


the  famous  Seleucidian  dynasty,  made  himself  master  of  the 
greater  part  of  western  Asia.  With  this  intelligent  but  in¬ 
tolerant  monarch  begins  a  new  chapter  in  the  development 
of  a  conscious  national  Jewish  life. 

"When  he  came  to  the  throne,  Judah  was  rapidly  being 
depopulated. 

The  ease  and  charm  of  Greek  city  life  were  beginning  to 
make  their  influence  felt  upon  the  last  remaining  adherents 
of  Jewish  culture. 

Very  soon  the  entire  Jewish  nation  would  have  been  ab¬ 
sorbed  by  that  strange  Hellenistic  civilisation  which  was  a 
perfect  blend  of  all  that  was  good  and  bad  in  Asia  and  Europe. 

But  Antiochus  Epiphanes  had  not  learned  the  wisdom  of 
leaving  well-enough  alone.  Within  a  single  lifetime,  he  undid 
all  the  work  of  his  predecessors  and  turned  the  lukewarm 
Jews  once  more  into  ardent  patriots. 


REVOLUTION  AND  INDEPENDENCE 


CHAPTER  XIX 


TWO  HUNDRED  YEARS  LATER,  A  JEWISH  FAMILY  BY 
THE  NAME  OF  THE  MACCABEES  BEGAN  A  REVOLUTION 
AND  TRIED  TO  SET  THE  COUNTRY  FREE  FROM  FOR¬ 
EIGN  INFLUENCE.  BUT  THE  STATE  WHICH  THE  MAC¬ 
CABEES  TRIED  TO  FOUND  NEVER  FLOURISHED  AND 
WHEN  THE  ROMANS  CONQUERED  WESTERN  ASIA 
THEY  MADE  PALESTINE  A  SEMI-INDEPENDENT  KING¬ 
DOM  AND  APPOINTED  ONE  OF  THEIR  POLITICAL 
HENCHMEN  TO  BE  KING  OF  THE  UNHAPPY  LAND 

N  the  old  land  of  Canaan  there  was  not 
room  for  two  conflicting  forms  of 
>vorship. 

A  tribe  of  people  who  accepted 
Jehovah  as  the  one  absolute  and  undis- 
;  puted  master  of  their  world  could  not 
.  tolerate  the  rivalry  of  an  indefinite 
Zeus  who  was  said  (by  the  heathen,  of 
course)  to  live  on  the  top  of  a  savage  rock  somewhere  in  the 
land  of  the  Barbarians. 

Antiochus  Epiphanes  failed  to  recognise  this.  As  a  result, 
he  wasted  most  of  his  years  and  all  of  his  energy  upon  the 

297 


298 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


unsuccessful  attempt  to  turn  his  obstinate  Jewish  subjects 
into  unwilling  Greeks. 

He  was  (as  we  have  said)  the  eighth  ruler  of  the  family 
of  the  Seleucids,  and  he  ought  to  have  known  better. 

But  when  he  was  quite  young,  he  had  been  sent  to  Rome 
as  a  hostage.  He  had  spent  fifteen  years  of  his  life  in  the  city 
which  then  was  the  centre  of  the  entire  world,  both  civilised 
and  otherwise. 

Rome  had  grown  immensely  rich  and  the  old  simple  virtues 
of  the  nation  (if  they  had  ever  existed,  which  we  sincerely 
doubt)  had  made  room  for  the  more  amusing  but  less  pon¬ 
derous  entertainment  provided  by  a  large  and  important  colony 
of  Greeks. 

The  Greeks  in  those  days  played  the  role  of  the  foreigner 
in  modern  New  York.  The  typical  American  builds  and  buys 
and  sells  and  plans  and  looks  after  the  material  needs  of  his 
continent. 

But  his  orchestras  are  composed  of  Germans  and  Dutch¬ 
men  and  Frenchmen,  and  his  theatres  devote  much  of  their 
time  to  plays  written  by  Russians  and  Norwegians,  and  his 
restaurants  employ  French  cooks  and  his  pictures  are  painted 
for  him  by  half  a  dozen  European  nations. 

The  American  is  too  busy  to  attend  to  all  those  matters,  and 
patiently  (if  sometimes  somewhat  contemptuously)  he  leaves 
them  to  people  who  can  do  those  things  better  than  he  can 
do  them  himself,  but  who  lack  the  necessary  ambition  for  a  life 
of  political  or  physical  creation. 

It  was  not  different  in  the  Rome  of  the  late  Repubhc  and 
the  early  Empire. 

The  Roman  was  first  of  all  a  soldier  and  a  law-giver  and  a 
statesman  and  a  tax-gatherer  and  a  road-builder  and  a  city- 
planner. 


REVOLUTION  AND  INDEPENDENCE 


299 


He  conquered  and  administered  the  entire  known  world 
from  the  dark  and  foggy  coast  of  Wales  to  the  endless  plains 
of  Dacia  and  the  scorching  sands  of  northern  Africa. 

That  was  his  job. 

He  did  it  well  and  he  liked  it. 

But  he  was  too  busy  to  bother  about  such  details  as  schools 
and  academies  and  theatres  and  churches  and  candy-stores. 

And  so  Rome  soon  was  swarming  with  the  brilliant  but 
none  too  reliable  progeny  of  Pericles  and  ^schylus  and 
Phidias. 

They  were  very  plausible  orators,  those  handsome  black¬ 
haired  Greek  teachers  who  talked  vaguely  of  a  thousand  things 
of  which  the  honest  Roman  had  never  heard,  and  which  there¬ 
fore  had  meant  nothing  in  his  life. 

They  could  argue  about  the  Gods  and  in  the  same  breath 
they  could  tell  a  man  how  to  dress.  They  could  explain  the 
mysteries  of  a  new  Oriental  religion  to  the  women  and  at  the 
same  time  give  them  a  few  useful  hints  about  the  use  of  cos¬ 
metics.  They  were  never  at  a  loss  for  a  jesting  word,  and 
altogether,  they  turned  the  dull  and  dour  Roman  community 
into  something  which  began  to  resemble  that  famed  market¬ 
place  at  the  foot  of  the  Acropolis. 

Young  Antiochus,  fresh  from  distant  Syria,  fell  an  easy 
victim  to  the  agreeable  lure  of  the  great  and  wonderful  city 
(like  a  youngster  from  a  bleak  farm  in  northern  Michigan 
thrown  into  the  heart  of  New  York),  and  during  the  fifteen 
years  of  his  residence,  he  developed  into  such  an  ardent  admirer 
of  Greek  philosophy  and  Greek  art  and  Greek  music  and 
everything  Greek,  that  Alcibiades  himself  could  not  have 
been  more  devout  in  his  love  for  the  superior  virtues  of  Athens 
than  this  little  Asiatic  crown-prince. 

Of  course,  as  soon  as  the  young  man  was  called  back  to  his 


300 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


own  kingdom,  he  was  bitterly  disappointed  by  what  he  found 
at  home. 

Jerusalem  had  never  regained  the  old  splendour  of  David 
and  Solomon.  Even  in  those  early  days,  it  would  have  ranked 
as  a  backward  village  when  compared  to  such  worldly-wise 
centres  as  Corinth  and  Athens  and  Rome  and  Carthage. 

It  had  always  been  just  a  little  off  the  beaten  track  of 
civilisation.  It  was  regarded  by  the  Babylonians  and  the 
Greeks  and  the  Egyptians  (if  they  ever  thought  of  it  at  all) 
as  a  nice  but  decidedly  provincial  centre,  inhabited  by  a  narrow¬ 
minded  and  uncomfortable  set  of  people  who  regarded  them¬ 
selves  with  undue  seriousness  and  showed  a  very  evident  con¬ 
tempt  for  everything  foreign. 

The  period  of  the  great  exile  had  not  improved  matters. 
Many  of  the  Jews  had  preferred  to  remain  in  Babylon.  Two 
centuries  later,  the  greater  part  of  the  survivors  had  been  lured 
away  to  Alexandria  and  Damascus,  and  as  we  have  seen  in  the 
last  chapter,  only  the  most  pious  had  remained  and  they  turned 
the  intellectual  life  of  Jerusalem  into  a  very  exclusive  theologi¬ 
cal  debating  society. 

And  now  Antiochus,  fresh  from  the  delights  of  Rome,  talk¬ 
ing  and  thinking  of  athletic  feasts  and  Dionysian  processions, 
was  obliged  to  spend  his  days  among  sombre  and  morose  schol¬ 
ars  who  were  staring  themselves  blind  upon  obscure  para¬ 
graphs  of  an  ancient  law  for  which  their  ruler  and  his  friends 
felt  and  expressed  a  most  profound  dislike. 

Antiochus  rashly  decided  to  become  the  apostle  of  the  supe¬ 
rior  Greek  culture. 

But  he  was  like  a  man  who  endeavours  to  hasten  the  natural 
progress  of  a  glacier. 

He  accomplished  very  little  and  caused  a  great  disaster. 


REVOLUTION  AND  INDEPENDENCE 


301 


At  first  he  tried  to  make  use  of  the  usual  dissensions  among 
his  Jewish  subjects  to  further  his  own  ends. 

There  was  one  small  party  in  the  country  which  was  not 
entirely  unfriendly  towards  the  Greek  mode  of  living. 

Encouraged  by  these,  Antiochus  held  athletic  games  in 
Jerusalem  and  sent  some  money  to  certain  sacrificial  festivals 
which  were  being  held  in  honour  of  the  Greek  gods.  This 
greatly  offended  his  religious  subjects,  but  they  had  just  been 
caught  in  a  scandal  of  their  own  and  until  that  should  have 
been  straightened  out,  nothing  could  be  done. 

It  happened  that  two  rival  candidates  were  both  trying 
to  become  High  Priest. 

One  of  them,  by  the  name  of  Menelaus,  had  offered  the 
King  several  hundred  thousand  dollars  if  he  were  appointed. 
It  seemed  a  great  deal  of  money  to  his  neighbours,  and  truth 
to  tell,  it  was  much  more  than  the  poor  man  could  ever  hope 
to  pay. 

To  get  hold  of  the  initial  instalment,  he  was  obliged  to  steal 
the  Temple  funds.  When  this  was  discovered,  there  was  a  great 
outcry  against  Menelaus,  and  suddenly  every  one  was  in  favour 
of  Jason,  his  opponent,  who  was  not  a  whit  better. 

A  quarrel  followed,  which  the  King  of  Egypt  used  as  an 
opportunity  to  raid  the  city  of  Jerusalem,  and  plunder  the 
Temple  (in  which  by  this  time  very  little  of  any  value  had  been 
left) . 

Antiochus  appealed  to  his  friends  in  Rome  for  help. 

But  one  difficulty  leading  to  another,  he  decided  to  visit 
the  capital  himself  and  plead  his  own  cause  before  the  senate. 

The  great  Republic,  however,  had  no  interest  in  the  private 
quarrels  of  its  allies.  Provided  the  tribes  of  western  Asia  did 
not  upset  the  peace  of  the  Empire  or  interfere  with  the  safety 
of  the  great  international  roads,  they  could  do  whatever  they 


302 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


wanted.  A  war  in  the  Orient  would  probably  have  interfered 
with  Asiatic  commerce.  Antiochus  and  Egypt  therefore  were 
both  warned  to  behave,  but  nothing  was  done  beyond  this. 

The  turbulent  young  man,  once  the  Egyptians  were  gone, 
was  free  to  devote  all  his  time  and  all  his  attention  to  the  noble 

task  of  eradicating  what  he  was 
pleased  to  call  his  subjects’ 
superstitions. 

He  certainly  worked  with  a 
will. 

He  gave  curt  orders  that  the 
old  J  ewish  ceremonial  must 
come  to  an  end.  The  Sabbath 
was  no  longer  to  be  observed  and 
sacrifices  to  Jehovah  must  be 
discontinued  as  belonging  to  an 
old  and  happily  forgotten  period 
of  barbarism. 

Those  books  of  the  Law  which  could  be  gathered  by  his 
henchmen  were  burned  and  the  possession  of  such  a  book  by  a 
private  citizen  was  identical  with  a  self-imposed  sentence  of 
death. 

The  people  of  Jerusalem,  living  in  an  imaginary  world  of 
rules  and  regulations  and  prophetic  visions,  were  rudely  awa¬ 
kened  to  these  brutal  and  unwelcome  facts.  They  closed  the 
gates  of  the  city  and  tried  to  resist  the  royal  commands.  But 
the  Syrian  general  attacked  the  temple  on  the  Sabbath  day. 
Again  the  Jews  refused  to  fight  and  Jerusalem  was  at  the 
mercy  of  Antiochus. 

Those  inhabitants  who  could  be  profitably  sold  as  slaves 
were  spared.  The  others  were  killed.  No  mercy  was  shown 
to  the  Temple. 


REVOLUTION  AND  INDEPENDENCE 


303 


In  the  month  of  December  of  the  year  168  before  the  birth 
of  Christ,  a  new  altar  was  erected  upon  the  site  of  the  altar  of 
burnt-offering  which  had  been  pulled  down. 

When  it  was  ready,  it  was  dedicated  to  the  worship  of 
Zeus,  with  a  liberal  offering  of  dead  pigs. 

As  the  pig  was  the  most  offensive  animal  to  the  Jew  (the 
touch,  yes,  the  sight  of  which  made  him  feel  uncomfortable  and 
unclean) ,  the  insult  was  without  parallel  in  the  history  of  the 
world. 

The  Jews  submitted  because  they  had  to.  A  strong  gar¬ 
rison,  comfortably  housed  in  a  newly  built  fortress,  watched 
over  the  survivors  with  relentless  eagerness.  And  woe  to  the 
man  or  the  woman  who  tried  to  substitute  the  flesh  of  an  ox 
for  that  of  a  pig  which  now  had  to  be  placed  upon  the  dese¬ 
crated  shrines  of  their  unfortunate  city. 

Of  course,  this  silly  tyranny  brought  its  own  punishment, 
as  Antiochus  was  to  experience  ere  long. 

Some  six  miles  away  from  Jerusalem,  well  towards  the 
north  in  the  little  border  village  of  Modin,  lived  an  old  priest 
called  Mattathias  together  with  his  five  stalwart  sons. 

In  the  course  of  the  new  dispensation,  the  messengers  of 
Antiochus  came  to  Modin  and  demanded  that  the  inhabitants 
should  worship  Zeus  according  to  the  latest  regulation.  The 
people  came  together  in  the  market-place.  They  did  not  quite 
know  what  to  do.  Antiochus  was  near  and  Jehovah  was  far 
away. 

Soon  a  poor,  frightened  peasant  was  found  willing  to  per¬ 
form  the  prescribed  ritual. 

This  was  too  much  for  Mattathias.  He  took  his  sword 
and  he  cut  down  the  poor  rustic  and  with  a  second  blow  he 
killed  the  official  who  had  dared  to  suggest  such  a  terrible  act 
of  sacrilege  to  the  faithful  children  of  J ehovah. 


304 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Thereafter,  of  course,  there  was  only  one  thing  which  Mat- 
tathias  and  his  sons  could  do. 

They  fled. 

They  crossed  the  mountains  and  escaped  into  the  valley  of 
the  river  Jordan. 


All  through  the  land  the  people  heard  the  good  news.  The 
power  of  the  King  had  been  openly  challenged. 

Jehovah  had  found  his  champion. 

And  those  who  still  believed  in  the  future  of  their  own  race 
escaped  in  the  dark  of  night  and  hastened  to  the  Jordan  to 
join  the  rebels. 

Antiochus  at  first  hoped  to  quell  this  riot  by  resorting  to 
his  former  strategy. 

Once  more  his  troops  were  told  to  attack  the  Jews  on  the 
Sabbath  day. 

But  Mattathias  was  a  practical  man.  He  preferred  to  live 
by  the  letter  of  the  law  rather  than  die  by  it. 

He  ordered  his  men  to  fight  and  the  Syrian  army  was  re¬ 
pulsed. 


REVOLUTION  AND  INDEPENDENCE  306 

Mattathias  was  too  old  for  the  hardships  of  campaigning. 
He  died,  but  his  sons,  John,  Simon,  Judas,  Eleazar  and  Jona¬ 
than,  succeeded  him  as  leaders  of  the  Jewish  patriots  and  the 
war  continued. 

Of  these  sons,  Judas,  the  third,  gained  the  greatest  fame. 
He  was  for  ever  in  the  thick  of  the  fighting  and  the  people 
called  him  Judas  Maccabee,  or  Judas  the  Hammer,  on  account 
of  his  bold  courage.  He  wisely  avoided  an  open  encounter 
with  the  well  drilled  troops  of  his  enemies  and  inaugurated  that 
strategy  of  guerilla  warfare  which  twenty  centuries  later  was 
used  so  successfully  by  General  Washington. 

He  never  allowed  the  Syrians  a  moment  of  rest. 

He  attacked  their  flanks  and  their  rear  and  surprised  them 
by  sudden  assaults  in  the  middle  of  the  night.  When,  however, 
the  Syrians  made  halt  and  drew  up  their  regiments  in  battle 
formation,  Judas  and  his  followers  would  vanish  into  the 
mountains.  But  as  soon  as  their  exasperated  opponents  had 
grown  tired  of  waiting  and  had  relaxed  their  guard,  they  re¬ 
turned,  and  killed  them  oflp  by  small  detachments. 

After  several  years  of  this  sort  of  skirmishing,  Judas  had 
so  skilfully  strengthened  his  position  that  he  could  risk  an 
expedition  against  Jerusalem. 

He  took  the  city  and  the  Temple  was  restored  in  all  its 
former  glory  and  holiness. 

Unfortunately,  just  when  at  the  height  of  his  fame,  Judas 
was  killed  in  a  skirmish  and  the  Jews  once  more  were  without 
a  leader. 

John  and  Eleazar  Maccabee  were  both  dead. 

John  had  been  captured  in  ambush  a  few  years  before  and 
had  been  executed,  while  Eleazar  had  accidentally  been  crushed 
by  a  war-elephant. 


306 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Jonathan,  the  youngest,  was  elected  commander-in-chief, 
hut  he  held  his  office  for  only  a  few  weeks.  Then  he  was  mur¬ 
dered  by  a  Syrian  officer  and  the  leadership  fell  to  Simon,  the 
only  surviving  son  of  old  Mattathias. 

Meanwhile  on  the  other  side,  Antiochus  had  died. 

His  son  had  succeeded  him;  but  immediately  afterwards, 
Demetrius  Soter,  a  nephew  of  Antiochus,  had  returned  from 
Rome,  had  murdered  his  cousin,  and  in  the  year  162  had  pro¬ 
claimed  himself  King  of  the  greater  part  of  western  Asia. 

This  was  a  stroke  of  luck  for  the  Jews. 

Demetrius  was  beset  by  so  many  difficulties  at  home,  that 
he  could  not  afford  the  extra  burden  of  a  Jewish  revolution. 

He  made  peace  with  Simon  Maccabee,  who  thereafter  ruled 
over  Judah  as  ‘‘High  Priest  and  Governor,”  a  somewhat  vague 
dignity  which  we  can  best  compare  to  the  position  held  eighteen 
centuries  later  by  Oliver  Cromwell,  when  he  was  made  “Lord 
High  Protector  of  England.” 

The  outside  world,  impressed  by  the  ability  of  the  Macca¬ 
bees,  virtually  recognised  the  new  Jewish  state  as  an  independ¬ 
ent  kingdom  and  accepted  the  “High  Priest  and  Governor” 
as  the  legitimate  ruler  of  a  new  country. 

Then  the  High  Priest  set  to  work  to  put  order  into  his 
state.  He  concluded  treaties  with  his  neighbours. 

Coins  were  struck  with  his  picture. 

The  army  recognised  him  as  their  chief. 

When  he  and  two  of  his  sons  were  murdered  in  the  year  135 
B.C.,  the  Maccabee  family  was  so  firmly  established  that  the 
throne  automatically  descended  to  John,  called  Hyrcanus,  who 
ruled  for  almost  thirty  years  and  was  the  recognised  sovereign 
of  a  small  but  well  organized  kingdom  in  which  Jehovah  was 
worshipped  according  to  the  most  rigid  exactions  of  the  ancient 


JUDAS  MACCABEE 


REVOLUTION  AND  INDEPENDENCE 


307 


laws  and  in  which  no  foreigner  was  tolerated,  except  for  a  short 
visit,  connected  with  important  business. 

But  alas!  as  soon  as  a  period  of  comparative  peace  had 
been  inaugurated,  the  Jews  once  more  became  a  victim  of 
those  old  religious  discussions  and  controversies  which  in  by¬ 
gone  days  had  done  so  much  harm  to  their  land. 

Theoretically,  the  country  was  still  a  theocracy.  The  High 
Priest  was  recognised  as  the  highest  official  of  the  state  and 
as  Mattathias  Maccahee  had  belonged  to  a  family  of  hereditary 
priests,  everything  was  according  to  the  strict  interpretation 
of  the  law. 

But  the  world  was  moving  rapidly. 

The  idea  of  a  theocracy  had  died  out  long  since  in  all  other 
parts  of  Asia  and  Europe  and  Africa. 

It  was  practically  impossible  to  maintain  it  in  this  little 
land-locked  community,  surrounded  on  all  sides  by  people 
who  had  willingly  adopted  the  modern  Greek  and  Roman 
ideas  upon  the  subject  of  statecraft. 

Under  pressure  from  abroad,  the  Jews  were  now  beginning 
to  be  divided  into  three  distinct  and  separate  parties,  each 
one  of  which  believed  in  a  different  set  of  principles  of  govern¬ 
ment  and  worship. 

These  three  groups  were  to  play  a  very  important  role  in 
the  history  of  the  next  two  centuries.  It  is  therefore  necessary 
to  discuss  them  in  some  detail. 

Most  important  of  all  were  the  Pharisees. 

We  do  not  know  much  about  their  origin. 

The  party  seems  to  have  been  founded  during  the  difficult 
years  preceding  the  Maccabean  revolt.  For  as  soon  as  Mat¬ 
tathias  had  raised  his  brave  sword  in  token  of  revolt,  he  found 
himself  backed  up  by  a  group  of  men  who  were  known  as  the 
“Hasideans,”  or  ‘‘the  pious.” 


308 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


When  the  struggle  for  independence  had  been  crowned  with 
success,  and  when  the  first  religious  enthusiasm  was  beginning 
to  wane,  the  Hasideans,  under  the  new  name  of  the  ‘‘Pharisees,” 
came  to  the  front  and  maintained  themselves  until  the  end  of 
the  independent  kingdom. 

Even  the  fury  of  Titus,  the  Emperor,  could  not  subdue 
their  ardour  and  many  of  them  have  survived  until  this  very 
day,  although  they  are  no  longer  restricted  to  the  old  Jewish 
faith. 

The  Pharisees  were  exactly  what  the  Hebrew  name  im¬ 
plied.  They  were  the  “separated  people.”  They  were  differ¬ 
ent  from  the  rest  of  the  people  on  account  of  their  fanatical 
allegiance  to  the  letter  of  the  law. 

They  knew  the  ancient  books  of  Moses  by  heart.  Every 
word,  almost  every  letter,  suggested  something  to  them. 

They  lived  in  a  world  of  strange  ordinances  and  even  more 
incomprehensible  taboos.  There  were  a  few  things  which  they 
must  do  and  a  thousand  things  which  they  must  omit  doing. 

They  and  only  they  were  the  true  followers  of  almighty 
Jehovah.  While  the  rest  of  humanity  was  condemned  to  eter¬ 
nal  perdition,  the  Pharisees,  by  their  painstaking  obedience  to 
every  comma  and  every  exclamation  mark  in  the  law,  were  sure 
to  enter  the  kingdom  of  Heaven. 

Generation  after  generation,  they  spent  the  valuable  hours 
of  the  day  and  of  the  night,  poring  over  the  ancient  scrolls, 
explaining,  annotating,  expounding,  interpreting  and  eluci¬ 
dating  obscure  and  totally  irrelevant  details  of  some  half  for¬ 
gotten  sentence  in  a  dark  chapter  of  Exodus. 

They  made  a  virtue  of  great  public  humility. 

But  in  their  heart  of  hearts,  they  were  inordinately  proud 
of  those  qualities  which  distinguished  them  (in  their  own  eyes) 


REVOLUTION  AND  INDEPENDENCE 


309 


from  all  other  men  and  women,  for  whom,  to  speak  the  truth, 
they  felt  only  the  deepest  contempt. 

At  first  the  Pharisees  were  undoubtedly  inspired  by  very 
high  motives  and  an  exalted  and  unselfish  patriotism,  based 
upon  an  invincible  faith  in  the  power  of  their  God. 

But  as  time  went  by,  they  developed  more  and  more  into  a 
meddlesome  sect  which  would  tolerate  no  dissension  from  the 
old-fashioned  prejudices  and  superstitions. 

Deliberately  they  turned  their  backs  upon  the  future  and 
fastened  their  eyes  firmly  upon  the  bygone  glory  of  the  Mosaic 
era. 

They  hated  everything  that  was  foreign. 

They  detested  all  innovations  and  decried  all  reformers  as 
enemies  of  the  state. 

And  when  the  greatest  of  all  prophets  spoke  to  them  of  a 
kindly  and  loving  God  and  preached  the  common  brotherhood 
of  all  men,  the  Pharisees  hurled  themselves  against  their  enemy 
with  such  violence  that  they  upset  and  wrecked  the  very  nation 
which  they  had  helped  to  found  only  a  short  time  before. 

Next  to  the  Pharisees  in  power,  but  not  quite  so  numerous, 
were  the  Sadducees. 

The  Sadducees  (who  probably  derived  their  name  from  a 
priest  called  Zadok)  were  much  more  tolerant  than  the  Phari¬ 
sees.  Their  tolerance,  however,  was  not  based  upon  conviction 
but  upon  indifference. 

They  belonged  to  the  small  class  of  well-educated  Jews. 
They  had  travelled.  They  had  seen  other  lands  and  other 
people,  and  while  they  were  faithful  in  their  worship  of  Je¬ 
hovah,  they  acknowledged  that  much  might  be  said  for  the 
noble  doctrines  of  life  and  death  which  were  preached  by  an 
increasing  number  of  Greek  philosophers. 

They  were  not  much  interested  in  the  world  of  the  Phari- 


310 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


sees,  which  was  being  increasingly  populated  with  devils  and 
angels  and  other  queer  imaginary  creatures,  brought  to  Pales¬ 
tine  by  travellers  from  the  east. 

They  accepted  life  as  they  found  it  and  tried  to  live  an 
honourable  existence  without  placing  too  much  faith  in  the 
promise  of  a  future  reward. 

Indeed,  when  the  Pharisees  tried  to  argue  with  them  on 
this  point,  they  were  apt  to  ask  for  some  corroborating  testi¬ 
mony  in  one  of  the  ancient  books,  and  none  was  forthcoming, 
as  none  was  given  in  those  venerable  scrolls. 

In  short,  the  Sadducees,  much  more  than  the  Pharisees, 
were  in  daily  contact  with  the  age  in  which  they  happened  to 
live. 

Consciously  or  unconsciously  they  had  absorbed  the  wis¬ 
dom  of  their  great  Greek  neighbours. 

They  recognised  the  importance  of  one  God,  be  he  called 
Jehovah  or  Zeus. 

But  they  did  not  feel  that  so  great  a  power  could  be  inter¬ 
ested  in  the  petty  details  of  human  existence.  Hence,  all  the 
purely  legalistic  considerations  of  the  Pharisees  appeared  to 
them  to  be  a  sheer  waste  of  time  and  energy. 

They  held  it  to  be  more  important  to  live  bravely  and  nobly 
than  to  flee  from  life  and  concentrate  upon  the  salvation  of 
one’s  own  soul  behind  the  safely  sheltering  walls  of  a  scholastic 
study. 

They  looked  forward,  rather  than  backward,  and  expressed 
scant  regrets  at  the  illusory  virtues  of  the  past  ages. 

Gradually  they  lost  all  interest  in  purely  religious  matters 
and  in  a  very  practical  fashion  devoted  themselves  to  politics. 

Years  afterwards,  when  the  Pharisees  insisted  upon  the 
death  of  Jesus  on  account  of  his  religious  heresies,  the  Sad¬ 
ducees  made  common  cause  with  them  and  denounced  the 


REVOLUTION  AND  INDEPENDENCE 


311 


Nazarene  prophet  because  he  seemed  to  be  a  menace  to  the 
established  law  and  order. 

They  were  not  interested  in  the  doctrines  of  Jesus. 

But  they  feared  the  political  consequences  of  his  ideas  and 
therefore  were  in  favour  of  his  execution. 

They  arrived  at  their  conclusions  in  a  different  way  from 
the  Pharisees. 

But  their  tolerance  was  as  sterile  and  as  narrow-minded  as 
the  avowed  intolerance  of  their  opponents  and  they  bore  an 
equal  share  in  the  final  drama  of  Golgotha  which  will  be  told 
in  one  of  the  last  chapters  of  this  book. 

There  remains  one  other  party  which  we  must  mention  for 
the  sake  of  historical  accuracy.  It  plays,  however,  no  great 
role  in  our  story. 

Many  of  the  Jews  lived  in  endless  fear  of  what  we  might 
call  unconscious  sin. 

Their  laws  were  so  complicated  that  no  one  could  ever  hope 
to  obey  every  jot  and  tittle  of  the  ancient  books. 

But  such  disobedience  (however  involuntary)  was  a  terrible 
sin  in  the  eyes  of  Jehovah,  who  himself  was  the  incarnation 
of  the  law,  and  would  be  punished  almost  as  severely  as  a  breach 
of  one  of  the  Ten  Commandments. 

To  escape  this  difficulty,  the  Essenes,  or  Holy  Men,  de¬ 
liberately  abstained  from  what  we  might  call  all  “acts  of  liv- 

•  »> 
mg. 

They  did  nothing  at  all. 

They  fled  into  the  wilderness,  far  away  from  all  strife,  and 
held  themselves  aloof  from  their  fellow  men. 

For  the  sake  of  greater  protection,  however,  they  often 
lived  in  small  colonies. 

They  did  not  believe  in  private  property.  What  belonged 
to  one,  belonged  to  all.  With  the  exception  of  his  clothes  and 


312  THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

his  bed  and  the  bowl  in  which  he  carried  his  food  from  the 
common  kitchen,  no  Essene  had  anything  that  he  could  call 
his  own. 

Part  of  each  day  the  members  of  those  pious  settlements 
were  expected  to  give  to  the  tilling  of  the  few  poor  corn  fields 
that  provided  them  with  food. 


THE  ESSENES  LIVED  IN  THE  WILDERNESS 


The  rest  of  the  time  they  could  spend  perusing  the  holy 
scriptures  and  torturing  their  unworthy  souls  with  the  study  of 
dark  and  dismal  points  in  the  books  of  long-forgotten  prophets. 

It  was  not  a  very  attractive  programme  to  most  people  and 
the  number  of  the  Essenes  remained  small  compared  to  that 
of  the  Pharisees  and  Sadducees. 

They  were  never  seen  in  the  streets  of  the  cities. 

They  did  not  engage  in  business,  and  they  avoided  all 
contact  with  political  life. 

They  were  happy  because  they  knew  that  they  were  saving 
their  own  souls,  but  they  did  remarkably  little  for  their  neigh- 


REVOLUTION  AND  INDEPENDENCE  313 

hours  and  exercised  no  direct  influence  upon  the  life  of  their 
nation. 

Indirectly,  however,  they  played  a  great  role. 

For  when  their  austere  asceticism  was  combined  with  the 
practical  eagerness  of  the  Pharisees  (as  it  was  in  the  case  of 
John  the  Baptist)  they  could  influence  large  numbers  of  people 
and  had  to  be  reckoned  with  very  seriously  as  a  power  in  the 
state. 

From  this  short  explanation,  the  reader  will  understand  that 
it  was  no  easy  task  to  rule  this  country  where  the  balance  of 
power  was  held  by  several  conflicting  groups  of  religious 
fanatics. 

The  Maccabees  did  their  best,  under  very  trying  circum¬ 
stances. 

During  the  flrst  hundred  years,  they  succeeded  fairly  well. 

But  with  John  Hyrcanus,  the  last  of  the  great  leaders  of 
this  dynasty  came  to  the  throne. 

His  unworthy  son,  Aristobulus,  the  “Friend  of  the  Greeks,” 
was  entirely  incompetent,  and  with  him  the  period  of  decline 
began. 

It  greatly  angered  him  that  his  Jewish  subjects  would  not 
let  him  assume  the  title  of  King,  although  he  really  held  all 
the  powers  usually  associated  with  that  name. 

To  the  Pharisees,  however,  with  their  love  for  detail  and 
their  respect  for  tradition,  such  small  distinctions  were  matters 
of  the  gravest  importance. 

The  Jews  had  accepted  the  rule  of  the  Judges  because  the 
Judges  had  always  most  carefully  abstained  from  claiming  the 
royal  title. 

Now  a  man  who  was  not  even  a  descendant  of  David  in¬ 
sisted  that  he  be  given  a  title  which  was  only  very  occasionally 
used  for  Jehovah  himself. 


314 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


The  Pharisees  were  in  a  fury,  and  Aristobulus,  looking 
around  for  some  support,  foolishly  enough  made  common 
cause  with  their  enemies. 

To  make  the  situation  still  more  complicated,  this  incident 
was  followed  by  one  of  those  family  quarrels  which  were  so 
common  in  those  early  days. 

The  mother  and  the  brothers  of  the  new  “King”  took  the 
side  of  his  enemies. 

It  came  to  open  warfare. 

The  mother  was  killed. 

A  little  later,  through  the  mistake  of  an  over-zealous  offi¬ 
cer,  Antigonus,  the  favourite  brother  of  Aristobulus,  was 
stabbed  to  death. 

Trying  to  make  his  subjects  forget  these  unpleasant  inci¬ 
dents  by  some  excitement  of  a  different  nature,  Aristobulus 
next  began  a  campaign  against  his  powerful  northern  neigh¬ 
bours. 

He  got  hold  of  the  greater  part  of  the  old  Kingdom  of 
Israel,  which  had  been  extinct  these  last  four  centuries.  He 
did  not  revive  the  name  Israel,  but  called  the  conquered  land 
Galilee,  after  one  of  the  districts  in  the  northern  hills. 

What  future  plans  Aristobulus  had,  we  do  not  know,  for 
he  was  taken  sick  and  died  after  a  reign  of  only  one  year. 

He  was  succeeded  by  his  brother,  Alexander  J annseus,  the 
third  son  of  John  Hyrcanus. 

This  young  man  had  been  in  exile  ever  since  he  had  been 
old  enough  to  attract  the  attention  of  his  father,  who  thoroughly 
detested  him.  He  ruled  for  almost  thirty  years  and  when  he 
died,  the  entire  kingdom  had  been  wasted  away. 

Like  Aristobulus,  the  young  prince  made  the  fatal  mistake 
of  taking  sides  in  the  quarrels  between  the  two  religious  parties. 


REVOLUTION  AND  INDEPENDENCE 


315 


And  following  the  example  of  his  ancestors,  he  tried  to  extend 
his  territories  at  the  expense  of  his  neighbours. 

Although  he  was  as  unsuccessful  abroad  as  he  was  at  home, 
he  never  learned  from  experience. 

His  wife,  Alexandra,  was  no  better.  She  became  a  tool  of 
the  Pharisees  and  the  actual  government  of  the  country  was 
in  the  hands  of  a  small  kitchen  cabinet  of  clever  leaders  who 
ruled  Judah  and  Galilee  for  the  benefit  of  their  own  friends. 

That  they  might  the  better  maintain  their  hold  upon  the 
country,  the  Pharisees  encouraged  Alexandra  to  appoint  Hyr- 
canus,  her  elder  son  and  one  of  their  most  tractable  pupils. 
High  Priest. 

This  was  not  at  all  to  the  liking  of  Aristobulus,  the  younger 
boy,  who  had  been  called  after  his  uncle  and  who  had  inherited 
many  of  the  less  desirable  qualities  of  that  defunct  and  un¬ 
regretted  relative. 

When  the  Pharisees,  carried  away  by  their  own  success, 
began  a  reign  of  terror  and  tried  to  execute  the  Sadducean 
leaders,  Aristobulus  proclaimed  himself  the  defender  of  the 
Sadducean  cause. 

The  Sanhedrin,  or  Council,  continued  to  be  dominated  by 
the  Pharisees,  but  Aristobulus  and  the  Sadducees  got  hold  of 
several  very  important  country  towns  and  soon  they  were 
strong  enough  to  threaten  the  safety  of  Jerusalem. 

At  this  moment  Alexandra  died. 

Her  sons  were  left  with  a  depleted  treasury  and  a  country 
split  wide  open  by  civil  strife. 

There  was  nothing  new  in  the  situation. 

This  turbulent  little  corner  of  the  world  had  forever  been 
in  a  turmoil  of  some  sort. 

But  times  and  circumstances,  as  we  have  said  before,  had 
changed. 


316 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


A  thousand  or  five  hundred  years  before,  no  one  had  cared 
what  those  Semitic  tribes  were  doing,  provided  they  stayed 
within  their  own  boundaries. 

But  the  greater  part  of  western  Asia  was  now  in  the 
hands  of  the  Romans,  who  had  inherited  the  empire  of  Alex¬ 
ander. 

They  were  mainly  interested  in  a  steady  and  uninterrupted 
flow  of  taxes. 

As  most  revenue  in  that  part  of  Asia  was  derived  from 
trade,  they  insisted  upon  that  outward  semblance  of  peace  and 
orderliness  without  which  no  credit  (and  therefore  no  com¬ 
merce)  was  possible. 

A  certain  king  of  Pontus,  in  Asia  Minor,  by  the  name  of 
Mithridates,  had  just  tried  to  interfere  with  the  Roman  policy. 
After  a  long  and  disastrous  war,  he  had  been  forced  to  commit 
suicide  and  his  empire  had  been  added  to  the  Republic. 

Oblivious  of  the  fate  of  this  rich  and  powerful  tyrant, 
Hyrcanus  and  Aristobulus  continued  to  quarrel  and  caused 
such  a  disturbance  that  Rome  heard  about  it. 

The  general  commanding  the  troops  in  the  east  was  ordered 
to  proceed  to  Jerusalem  and  report  upon  conditions.  When 
he  reached  the  city,  Aristobulus  and  his  friends  were  inside 
the  temple  and  Hyrcanus  with  his  followers  was  outside,  laying 
a  formal  siege  to  the  sacred  building,  which  was  really  a  very 
strong  fortress. 

As  soon  as  the  Romans  appeared  upon  the  scene,  both 
princes  asked  for  their  support. 

The  Roman  general,  with  that  cold  understanding  of  com¬ 
plicated  issues  so  characteristic  of  his  race,  decided  that  it 
would  be  much  easier  to  defeat  Hyrcanus,  whose  troops  were 
out  in  the  open,  than  Aristobulus,  who  was  hiding  behind  the 
high  walls  of  a  steep  rock. 


REVOLUTION  AND  INDEPENDENCE 


317 


He  drove  away  Hyrcanus,  and  by  this  simple  process, 
Aristobulus  became  ruler  of  the  land  of  J udah  and  of  Galilee. 

But  not  for  long. 

No  one  less  than  famous  Pompey  was  coming  east  and 
Hyrcanus  hastened  to  meet  him  that  he  might  plead  his  cause 
in  person. 

Aristobulus  no  sooner  heard  of  this  than  he  too  drove  post¬ 
haste  to  the  Roman  camp  to  tell  his  side  of  the  story  and 
recommend  himself  as  the  most  suitable  (because  the  most 
obedient)  candidate  for  whatever  government  the  Romans  in¬ 
tended  to  establish  in  his  part  of  the  world. 

But  ere  Pompey  fully  realised  what  all  these  arguments 
meant,  there  was  a  blast  of  trumpets. 

A  third  delegation  had  arrived. 

The  Pharisees  had  come  to  explain  to  Pompey  that  the 
Jewish  people  were  as  heartily  tired  of  one  prince  as  of  the 
other  and  wished  to  return  to  the  old  form  of  a  pure  theocracy 
on  a  strictly  Pharisaical  basis. 

Pompey,  not  caring  what  happened  as  long  as  caravans 
could  safely  pass  from  Damascus  to  Alexandria,  listened 
boredly  to  all  three,  and  then  refused  to  commit  himself. 

He  said  that  he  would  give  a  definite  answer  as  soon  as  he 
returned  from  an  expedition  against  certain  Arab  tribes  who 
were  beginning  to  make  trouble  in  those  districts  which  for¬ 
merly  had  belonged  to  the  Assyrian  Empire. 

Meanwhile,  all  three  parties  must  keep  the  peace  and  wait. 

Even  then,  the  Jews  did  not  fully  understand  the  hopeless¬ 
ness  of  their  position.  For  the  moment  Aristobulus  was  back 
in  his  capital,  he  behaved  as  if  he  were  really  the  king  of  all 
Judah  and  could  rule  his  domains  as  if  there  were  not  a  single 
Roman  soldier  in  all  the  world. 

This  lasted  just  as  long  as  Pompey  remained  in  the  east. 


318 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


But  immediately  after  his  victory  over  the  Arabs,  he  re¬ 
turned  westward  and  asked  why  his  wishes  had  been  disre¬ 
garded  in  this  flagrant  manner. 

Aristobulus,  badly  advised,  then  took  another  fatal  step. 

He  tried  to  play  the  role  of  his  great-great-grandfather. 

He  retired  to  the  Temple,  cut  down  the  bridge  which  con¬ 
nected  the  fortress  with  the  rest  of  the  city  and  openly  hoisted 
the  flag  of  revolt. 

It  was  a  most  unequal  fight.  Hyrcanus,  the  elder  brother, 
went  over  to  the  enemy  and  the  siege  of  the  Temple  began, 
according  to  the  best  and  the  most  efficient  methods  of  that  day. 

It  lasted  three  months. 

Inside  the  holy  edifice,  the  starving  garrison  suffered  great 
privations. 

Their  despair,  however,  gave  them  added  courage. 

Betrayed  by  Hyrcanus,  they  felt  themselves  to  be  the  de¬ 
fenders  of  the  holy  cause  of  Jehovah  and  that  of  Jewish  inde¬ 
pendence. 

Deserters  told  Pompey  of  this  outburst  of  religious 
fanaticism. 

Remembering  what  the  Syrians  had  done  a  few  genera¬ 
tions  before,  he  ordered  a  general  attack  to  be  made  on  the 
Sabbath  day. 

It  was  the  month  of  June  of  the  year  63  before  the  birth  of 
Christ. 

The  Roman  legions  stormed  the  Jewish  citadel  and  cap¬ 
tured  the  Temple  together  with  all  its  defenders. 

According  to  tradition,  more  than  twelve  thousand  soldiers 
were  killed  on  that  day. 

The  captive  officers  were  decapitated,  while  Aristobulus  and 
his  wife  and  children  were  taken  to  Rome  that  they  might 
march  in  the  triumphal  procession  of  the  Roman  general. 


REVOLUTION  AND  INDEPENDENCE 


319 


Afterwards,  however,  they  were  allowed  to  settle  peace¬ 
fully  in  one  of  the  suburbs  of  Rome,  where  they  laid  the 
foundations  for  that  Jewish  colony  which  was  to  play  such  an 
important  part  in  the  imperial  history  of  western  Europe  in 
the  days  of  Paul  and  Peter. 

Once  the  fighting  was  over,  the  Romans,  with  that  wise 
moderation  which  characterised  them  until  the  end  of  their  his¬ 
tory,  refrained  from  plundering  the  Temple  and  allowed  its 
continued  use  as  a  place  of  worship.  But  Pompey  got  scant 
gratitude  for  this  act  of  generosity. 

Out  of  sheer  curiosity  and  totally  ignorant  of  the  prejudices 
of  his  former  enemies,  Pompey  and  his  staff  in  the  course  of  a 
tour  of  inspection  happened  to  wander  into  the  Holy  of  Holies. 

It  proved  to  be  a  small  stone  room,  entirely  bare  and  empty. 

As  soon  as  the  Romans  had  convinced  themselves  that  this 
sacred  chamber  contained  nothing  of  interest,  they  left  it. 

But  to  the  Jews,  this  visit,  however  short,  on  the  part  of 
unclean  foreigners,  meant  a  sacrilege  which  must  bring  forth  a 
terrible  revenge  on  the  part  of  Jehovah. 

They  never  forgave  Pompey. 

Whatever  he  tried  to  do  for  his  newly  acquired  subjects 
was  as  naught  compared  to  this  one  unconscious  insult  to  their 
religious  pride. 

Pompey,  of  course,  never  knew  what  he  had  done. 

From  his  point  of  view,  he  had  been  most  unusually  lenient. 

He  had  allowed  Hyrcanus  to  return  to  Jerusalem  and  he 
had  even  appointed  him  High  Priest  to  pacify  the  Pharisees. 
As  a  final  act  of  grace,  he  had  given  him  the  rank  of  Ethnarch. 
This  was  a  rather  hazy  title  sometimes  bestowed  upon  former 
independent  sovereigns.  It  carried  little  power  but  flattered 
the  national  pride  of  the  conquered  race.  The  Romans  were 
very  generous  with  this  titular  distinction,  provided  the  candi- 


320 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


date  followed  their  instructions  and  behaved  with  the  necessary 
discretion. 

If  Hyrcanus  had  been  a  capable  man,  even  then  some¬ 
thing  might  have  been  saved  out  of  the  ruin  of  his  country. 

But  the  Ethnarch  was  wholly  incompetent  and  soon  lost 
what  little  prestige  he  still  enjoyed. 

Some  thirty  years  before,  when  Alexander  Janngeus,  the 
father  of  Hyrcanus  and  Aristobulus,  was  king,  he  had  ap¬ 
pointed  a  certain  Antipater  to  be  governor  of  the  district  of 
Edom  or  Idumaea,  situated  south  of  Jerusalem. 

The  original  Antipater  loved  to  fish  in  that  troubled  water 
which  according  to  the  old  proverb  is  apt  to  provide  a  clever 
and  unscrupulous  sportsman  with  a  liberal  catch. 

He  pretended  to  be  a  faithful  friend  of  Hyrcanus  and  often 
whispered  discreet  words  of  advice  into  his  ear. 

But  such  bits  of  gratuitous  council  were  inevitably  followed 
by  further  complications  and  by  additional  difficulties  in  the 
land  of  Judah. 

So  intelligently  did  Antipater  play  his  game  that  he  soon 
found  himself  basking  right  royally  in  the  pleasant  sun  of 
Homan  favour. 

When  civil  war  broke  out  in  Rome  and  when  the  armies  of 
Pompey  were  pitched  against  those  of  his  rival,  Caesar,  Anti¬ 
pater  waited  to  see  who  should  be  the  victor. 

As  soon  as  Pompey  had  been  defeated  on  the  field  of  Phar- 
salia  in  the  year  48  before  the  birth  of  Christ,  the  Idumsean 
ruler  made  common  cause  with  Csesar. 

In  return  for  this  loyal  support,  Csesar  bestowed  upon 
Antipater  the  dignity  of  a  Roman  citizen  and  tacitly  allowed 
him  to  become  the  power  behind  the  tottering  throne  of  the 
country  which  was  now  called  Judaea. 


REVOLUTION  AND  INDEPENDENCE 


321 


The  new  “citizen”  made  good  use  of  his  favoured  position. 

He  strengthened  his  hold  upon  the  people. 

His  Jewish  subjects  were  given  a  greater  degree  of  liberty 
than  they  had  enjoyed  for  a  long  time. 

They  were  exempted  from  service  in  the  Roman  armies 
and  were  allowed  to  rebuild  the  walls  of  Jerusalem. 

They  were  no  longer  forced  to  pay  the  small  tribute  which 
Pompey  had  exacted  from  them. 

And  they  regained  almost  complete  judicial  and  religious 
independence. 

But  Antipater  fared  no  better  at  the  hands  of  the  Pharisees 
than  Pompey  had  done.  They  accused  him  of  being  a  for¬ 
eigner  and  an  upstart  and  a  usurper  who  had  no  right  to  the 
throne  of  David. 

They  talked  of  making  Antigonus,  the  son  of  Aristobulus 
and  the  grandson  of  Alexander  Janngeus,  their  king.  Once 
more  they  behaved  as  if  they,  and  not  the  Romans,  were  the 
masters  of  western  Asia. 

In  this  instance  it  did  not  matter  very  much,  for  Antipater 
was  easily  their  superior  both  in  his  shrewdness  and  in  his  com¬ 
plete  lack  of  scruples. 

He  had  certain  ambitious  plans  for  his  own  dynasty  and 
felt  that  the  hour  had  come  to  dispose  of  the  house  of  Maccabee. 

He  moved  slowly,  but  never  lost  sight  of  his  ultimate  pur¬ 
pose. 

Just  when  everything  was  ready,  he  was  unfortunately 
poisoned  by  a  friend  of  Hyrcanus. 

But  his  son  Herod  continued  the  work  along  the  lines  laid 
down  by  his  father  and  with  equal  success. 

Antigonus  was  foolishly  encouraged  to  begin  a  revolution 
against  the  Roman  government. 


322 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


This  ill-timed  uprising  ended  in  the  disaster  which  Herod 
had  anticipated. 

Antigonus  with  a  few  soldiers  fled  to  the  Temple  and  after 
a  long  siege  which  greatly  embittered  the  Romans  he  was 
forced  to  surrender. 

Antigonus  begged  that  his  life  be  spared. 

The  Romans,  however,  refused  to  show  mercy  upon  this 
occasion. 

Hardly  a  year  had  gone  by  without  some  sort  of  disturbance 
in  their  Judgean  province. 

They  had  granted  the  Jews  all  sorts  of  privileges,  and  the 
Jews  in  return  had  repaid  them  with  a  succession  of  very  costly 
rebellions. 

This  time  they  were  resolved  to  make  an  example  which 
should  be  remembered  until  the  end  of  time. 

Antigonus  was  treated  like  an  ordinary  criminal. 

He  was  publicly  whipped  and  thereupon  decapitated. 

The  Maccabee  dynasty  came  to  an  end  and  Herod  received 
the  throne. 

He  married  Mariamne,  the  granddaughter  of  Hyrcanus, 
and  thereby  established  a  vague  relationship  with  the  legiti¬ 
mate  rulers  of  Judaea. 

In  this  way,  Herod,  by  the  grace  of  the  Roman  legions, 
became  king  of  part  of  the  Jews. 

It  was  the  thirty-seventh  year  before  the  beginning  of  our 
era,  and  much  was  wrong  with  the  world. 


THE  BIRTH  OF  JESUS 


CHAPTER  XX 

NOW  IT  HAPPENED  DURING  THE  REIGN  OF  ONE  OF 
THOSE  KINGS,  BY  THE  NAME  OF  HEROD,  THAT  MARY, 
THE  WIFE  OF  JOSEPH  THE  CARPENTER  FROM  NAZA¬ 
RETH,  GAVE  BIRTH  TO  A  SON  WHO  WAS  CALLED 
JOSHUA  BY  HIS  OWN  PEOPLE  AND  JESUS  BY  HIS 
GREEK  NEIGHBOURS 

N  the  year  117,  Tacitus,  the  Roman  his¬ 
torian,  tried  to  account  for  the  perse¬ 
cutions  of  a  new  sect  which  had  just 
taken  place  throughout  the  Empire. 
He  was  no  friend  of  Nero. 

All  the  same,  he  did  his  best  to  find 
some  excuse  for  this  particular  outrage. 
‘‘The  Emperor,”  so  he  wrote,  “has 
inflicted  cruel  tortures  upon  certain  men  and  women  who  are 
hated  for  their  crimes  and  who  are  called  ‘Christians’  by  the 
mob.  The  particular  Christ  from  whom  they  have  taken  their 
name  was  put  to  death  under  the  Emperor  Tiberius  by  a  cer¬ 
tain  Pontius  Pilate,  who  happened  to  be  procurator  of  Judaea, 
a  distant  province  in  Asia.  Although  repressed  for  a  while, 
this  terrible  and  detestable  superstition  has  broken  out  again, 

323 


324 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


not  only  in  Judsea,  the  ground  of  the  evil,  but  also  in  Rome, 
to  which  city,  unfortunately,  all  the  infamies  and  irregularities 
of  the  world  tend  to  gravitate.” 

Tacitus  mentioned  the  whole  matter  in  that  detached  way 
in  which  an  Enghsh  journalist  of  the  year  1776  might  have 
referred  to  certain  insignificant  revolutionary  outbreaks  which 
had  occurred  in  a  distant  colony  of  the  Empire  but  which  were 
not  supposed  to  be  of  a  very  serious  nature. 

The  Roman  did  not  know  exactly  who  those  “Christians” 
of  whom  he  wrote  so  contemptuously  were  or  who  that  Christ 
was  from  whom  “they  had  taken  their  name,” 

He  did  not  know  and  he  did  not  care. 

There  always  was  trouble  of  some  sort  in  a  state  as  big 
and  as  complicated  as  the  Roman  Empire  and  the  Jews  who 
were  to  be  found  in  most  of  the  larger  cities  were  always 
quarrelling  among  each  other  and  invariably  exasperated  the 
magistrate  to  whom  they  carried  their  disputes  by  their  faithful 
tenacity  to  certain  incomprehensible  laws. 

The  Christ  in  question  had  probably  been  a  preacher  in 
some  obscure  little  synagogue  in  Galilee  or  Judasa. 

Of  course  there  was  more  than  a  probability  that  Nero  had 
been  a  bit  too  severe. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  was  better  not  to  be  too  lenient  in 
such  matters.  And  there  the  question  rested,  as  far  as  Tacitus 
was  concerned. 

He  never  mentioned  the  offending  sect  again. 

His  interest  was  entirely  academic  and  such  as  we  our¬ 
selves  might  take  in  the  trouble  between  the  Canadian  Mounted 
Police  and  those  strange  Russian  sects  which  inhabit  the  west¬ 
ern  portion  of  that  vast  empire  of  forests  and  grain  fields. 

The  information  which  other  writers  of  that  period  throw 
upon  the  same  subject  leaves  us  little  wiser. 


THE  BIRTH  OF  JESUS 


325 


Josephus,  a  Jew,  who  in  the  year  80  of  our  era  published 
a  detailed  history  of  his  country,  mentions  Pontius  Pilate  and 
John  the  Baptist,  but  we  do  not  find  the  name  of  Jesus  in  the 
original  version  of  his  work.  ^ 

Justus  of  Tiberias,  who  wrote  at  the  same  time  as  Josephus, 
had  apparently  never  heard  of  Jesus,  although  he  was  thor¬ 
oughly  familiar  with  the  Jewish 
history  of  the  first  two  centuries. 

There  is  complete  silence  on 
the  part  of  all  contemporary 
historians  and  we  depend  for 
our  knowledge  entirely  upon  the 
first  four  books  of  the  I^ew 
Testament,  which  are  called  the 
four  “gospels,”  an  old  English 
word  which  meant  “good  tid¬ 
ings.” 

Like  the  book  of  Daniel  and 
the  Psalms  of  David,  and  many  other  chapters  of  the  Old 
Testament,  the  Gospels  bear  fictitious  names. 

They  are  called  after  the  apostles  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke 
and  John,  but  it  seems  very  unlikely  that  the  original  disciples 
had  anything  to  do  with  those  famous  literary  compositions. 

The  subject  is  still  shrouded  in  deep  mystery.  For  many 
centuries  it  has  been  a  favourite  subject  for  scholastic  dispute, 
but  as  no  form  of  altercation  seems  more  futile  and  unprofitable 
than  that  connected  with  theological  subjects,  we  shall  refrain 
from  giving  a  definite  opinion,  but  shall  in  a  few  words  try 
to  explain  why  this  topic  has  given  rise  to  so  much  discussion. 

Of  course,  to  the  people  of  the  modern  world,  who  from 
childhood  on  are  obliged  to  wade  through  a  veritable  mire  of 
printed  wood-pulp  (newspapers,  books,  time-tables,  menus, 


JOSEPHUS 


( 


326 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


telephone  directories,  passports,  telegrams,  letters,  income  tax 
blanks,  and  what  not),  it  seems  incredible  that  we  should  not 
possess  a  single  written  scrap  of  contemporary  evidence  for  the 
life  and  the  death  of  Jesus. 

But  historically  speaking,  there  is  nothing  very  unusual 
or  startling  in  this. 

The  famous  songs  of  Homer  were  not  written  down  until 
centuries  after  the  disappearance  of  those  travelling  bards  who 
used  to  wander  from  village  to  village  and  recite  the  glories 
of  Hector  and  Achilles  to  admiring  groups  of  young  Greeks. 

In  those  early  days,  when  people  depended  for  their  infor¬ 
mation  upon  the  spoken  word,  they  developed  very  accurate 
memories.  Stories  were  transmitted  from  father  to  son  just 
as  carefully  as  they  are  now  handed  over  to  posterity  by  means 
of  the  printed  word. 

Furthermore,  we  must  not  forget  that  Jesus,  once  he  had 
refused  to  assume  the  role  of  a  Jewish  national  leader  (a  fond 
hope  of  many  of  his  own  people),  was  obliged  to  associate 
almost  exclusively  with  very  poor  and  simple  fisherfolk  and 
inn-keepers,  none  of  whom  were  expert  editors,  and  most  of 
whom  were  undoubtedly  ignorant  of  the  art  of  writing. 

And  finally,  once  he  had  been  crucified,  it  seemed  a  sheer 
waste  of  time  to  give  an  account  of  his  life  or  his  teaching. 

The  disciples  of  Jesus  firmly  believed  that  the  end  of  the 
world  was  near  at  hand.  While  preparing  for  the  final  judg¬ 
ment,  they  did  not  care  to  compose  books  which  soon  would  be 
destroyed  by  the  fire  from  Heaven. 

As  the  years  went  by,  however,  and  it  became  more  and 

more  certain  that  the  world  was  going  to  continue  upon  its 

/ 

tranquil  voyage  through  space  for  many  centuries  to  come, 
efforts  were  made  to  gather  the  memoirs  of  those  who  had 


THE  BIRTH  OF  JESUS 


327 


known  Jesus  personally  and  who  had  heard  him  speak  and  who 
had  been  the  companions  of  his  last  years* 

Many  of  these  were  undoubtedly  still  alive  and  they  told 
all  they  knew.  Gradually  torn  bits  of  the  prophet’s  famous 
sermons  which  they  remembered  were  put  together  until  they 
made  a  book. 

Next  the  parables  were  retold  and  gathered  into  another 
volume. 

Old  men  and  old  women  in  Nazareth  were  interviewed. 

In  Jerusalem,  several  people  who  had  gone  out  to  Golgotha 
to  witness  the  execution  gave  an  account  of  the  last  hours  and 
the  agony  of  Jesus. 

Soon  there  was  quite  a  literature  upon  the  subject. 

It  increased  as  the  demand  for  such  books  grew  more 
popular.  Within  a  very  short  time,  the  material  assumed  un¬ 
wieldy  proportions. 

If  you  want  a  modern  example,  take  the  case  of  Abraham 
Lincoln.  There  is  a  steady  outpouring  of  volumes,  big  and 
little,  devoted  to  the  life  and  death  of  the  greatest  of  our 
American  prophets.  It  is  impossible  for  the  average  person 
to  read  all  these  books.  Even  if  he  knew  where  to  find  them 
all,  he  would  hardly  be  able  to  choose  what  was  really  essential. 

Therefore,  every  now  and  then,  some  scholar  who  has 
devoted  his  life  to  this  subject  sifts  all  the  evidence  and  gives 
the  public  a  short  and  concise  “Life  of  Lincoln”  which  throws 
light  upon  the  important  issues  but  leaves  out  what  would 
not  really  interest  those  who  are  not  professional  historians. 

That  is  exactly  what  the  authors  of  the  four  gospels  did 
with  the  life  of  J esus.  Each  one,  according  to  his  own  tastes 
and  ability,  retold  the  story  of  the  suffering  and  the  triumph 
of  his  Master  in  his  own  words. 

No  one  can  state  with  certainty  who  Matthew  was  or  when 


328 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


he  lived.  But  from  the  way  in  which  he  gives  us  his  good 
tidings,  we  know  him  as  a  simple  fellow  who  loved  the  homely 
stories  which  Jesus  used  to  tell  to  the  peasants  of  Galilee  and 
who  therefore  by  preference  dwelt  upon  the  subject  of  parables 
and  sermons. 

Far  different  was  John.  He  must  have  been  a  learned  if 
somewhat  dull  professor,  thoroughly  familiar  with  the  most 
modern  doctrines  then  being  taught  in  the  academies  of  Alex¬ 
andria,  and  giving  to  his  ‘‘Life  of  Jesus”  a  dignified  theological 
turn  which  is  entirely  lacking  in  the  other  three  gospels. 

Luke,  after  whom  the  third  gospel  is  called,  was  a  doctor, 
according  to  tradition. 

He  well  may  have  been  a  schoolmaster. 

He  stated  with  great  solemnity  that  he  had  read  all  the 
other  lives  of  Christ  which  were  then  in  circulation,  but  that  he 
did  not  think  any  of  them  quite  satisfactory.  He  therefore 
had  decided  to  write  a  book  of  his  own. 

He  expected  to  tell  his  readers  all  that  was  already  known, 
and  to  add  a  few  details  which  had  never  been  published  before. 
True  to  his  promise  he  bestowed  much  time  and  attention  upon 
details  which  had  escaped  Matthew  and  John,  and  by  his  pains¬ 
taking  research,  rendered  us  all  a  great  service. 

As  for  Mark,  he  was  (and  still  is)  a  subject  for  the  special 
attention  of  all  Biblical  scholars. 

Against  the  hazy  background  of  the  last  days  of  Jesus,  we 
get  frequent  glimpses  of  a  bright  and  intelligent  young  man 
who  played  a  definite  although  very  minor  role  in  the  tragedy 
of  Golgotha. 

Sometimes  we  see  him  running  errands  for  Jesus. 

On  the  night  of  the  last  supper  he  comes  rushing  into  the 
garden  of  Gethsemane  to  warn  the  Prophet  that  the  soldiers 
of  the  Council  are  coming  to  arrest  him. 


THE  BIRTH  OF  JESUS 


329 


We  hear  of  him  again  as  the  secretary  and  the  travelling 
companion  of  Paul  and  of  Peter. 

But  we  never  know  quite  who  he  was  or  what  he  actually 
did  or  in  what  relation  he  stood  to  Jesus  himself. 

The  gospel  which  bears  his  name  makes  the  matter  more 
complicated.  It  seems  to  be  just  the  sort  of  work  which  just 
that  sort  of  young  man  might  have  done  exceedingly  well.  It 
shows  a  personal  familiarity  with  many  events.  It  omits  a 
great  deal  which  is  given  in  the  other  gospels,  but  when  it  stops 
to  describe  a  certain  event  with  some  detail,  the  story  becomes 
at  once  a  living  document  and  is  full  of  picturesque  little  anec¬ 
dotes. 

This  intimate  and  personal  touch  has  often  been  used  as 
absolute  proof  that  in  this  instance  at  least  we  have  to  do  with 
the  work  of  a  man  who  had  first-hand  knowledge  of  his  subject. 

But  alas !  the  gospel  of  Mark,  like  all  the  others,  has  certain 
literary  characteristics  which  place  it  definitely  in  the  second 
century  and  make  it  the  work  of  one  of  the  grandchildren  of 
the  original  Mark  and  Matthew  and  John. 

The  complete  absence  of  all  contemporary  evidence  has 
always  been  a  strong  argument  in  the  hands  of  those  who 
claim  that  all  our  efforts  to  re-create  the  life  of  Jesus  upon 
an  historical  basis  must  be  futile  and  must  remain  so  until 
further  evidence  (which  may  lie  buried  almost  anywhere)  shall 
have  given  us  the  connecting  link  between  the  first  half  of  the 
first  and  the  latter  half  of  the  second  century. 

Personally,  however,  we  cannot  share  this  opinion. 

While  it  is  undoubtedly  true  that  the  actual  authors  of  the 
Gospels,  as  we  have  them  to-day,  had  not  personally  known 
Jesus,  it  is  equally  evident  to  any  one  who  has  seriously  studied 
those  documents  that  they  derive  their  common  information 


330 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


from  a  number  of  texts  which  were  current  in  the  year  200 
hut  which  have  been  lost  since  then. 

Such  gaps  are  quite  common  in  early  European  and  Ameri¬ 
can  and  Asiatic  history.  Even  the  famous  book  of  nature  is 
apt  to  indulge  in  an  occasional  jump  of  a  couple  of  million 
years,  during  which  period  we  are  allowed  to  use  our  imagina¬ 
tion  as  best  pleases  our  fancy,  or  our  scientific  convictions. 

In  the  present  case,  however,  we  are  not  obliged  to  deal 
with  vague  prehistoric  figures,  but  with  a  personality  of  such 
extraordinary  charm  and  such  definite  strength,  that  it  has 
outlived  everything  else  that  existed  twenty  centuries  ago. 

Besides,  the  direct  documentary  evidence  which  is  so  desir¬ 
able  in  the  historical  laboratory  seems  utterly  superfluous  when 
we  speak  or  write  of  Jesus.  The  very  literature  written  around 
the  figure  of  the  prophet  of  Nazareth  will  bear  us  out. 

The  number  of  books  which  deal  with  him  and  his  work 
written  during  the  last  two  thousand  years  cannot  be  counted. 
They  represent  every  language,  every  dialect  and  every  con¬ 
ceivable  point  of  view. 

With  equal  zeal  they  either  prove  or  they  disprove  his 
existence. 

They  affirm  or  question  the  authority  and  the  reliability 
of  the  evidence  presented  to  us  by  the  gospels. 

They  doubt  or  reverently  uphold  the  absolute  trustworthi¬ 
ness  of  the  letters  written  by  the  apostles. 

But  that  is  not  all. 

Every  single  word  of  the  New  Testament  has  been  most 
carefully  submitted  to  the  acid  tests  of  philological  and  chrono¬ 
logical  and  dogmatic  criticism. 

Wars  have  been  fought  and  countries  have  been  devastated 
and  whole  nations  have  been  eradicated  because  two  eminent 
expounders  of  the  Scriptures  happened  to  disagree  upon  some 


THE  BIRTH  OF  JESUS 


331 


difficult  point  in  the  Apocalypse  or  the  Acts  which  had  nothing 
at  all  to  do  with  the  ideals  of  Jesus.  Mighty  churches  have 
been  built  to  commemorate  certain  facts  which  never  took 
place  and  terrific  assaults  have  been  made  upon  certain  events 
which  are  of  undeniable  truth. 

Christ  has  been  preached  to  us  as  the  Son  of  God  and  he 
has  been  denounced  (sometimes  with  incredible  violence  and 
persistency)  as  an  impostor. 

Patient  archaeologists  have  dug  deep  into  the  folklore  of  a 
thousand  tribes  to  explain  the  mystery  of  the  Man  who  became 
a  God. 

The  sublime,  the  ridiculous  and  the  obscene  have  been 
dragged  into  the  discussion  with  a  wealth  of  texts  and  sources 
and  clauses  and  paragraphs  which  seemed  absolutely  irre¬ 
futable. 

And  it  has  made  no  difference. 

Perhaps  the  early  disciples  knew  best. 

They  did  not  write,  they  did  not  argue,  and  they  did  not 
reason  overmuch. 

They  gratefully  accepted  what  was  given  to  them  and  they 
left  the  rest  to  faith. 

Out  of  this  loving  inheritance,  we  must  try  to  reconstruct 
our  story. 

***** 

Herod  was  King,  and  a  bad  King  he  was. 

His  throne  stood  based  upon  murder  and  deceit. 

He  knew  no  principles,  but  he  had  an  ambition. 

The  memory  of  great  Alexander  was  still  alive  in  west¬ 
ern  Asia. 

What  a  little  Macedonian  prince  had  done,  three  hundred 
years  before,  a  more  powerful  Jewish  king  might  do  to-day. 

And  so  Herod  played  a  game  of  cold  and  brutal  calculation 


332 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


and  worked  for  the  greater  glory  of  the  house  of  Antipater  and 
cared  for  neither  man  nor  God,  with  the  sole  exception  of  that 
Roman  governor  by  whose  grace  he  was  allowed  to  hold  his 
nefarious  throne. 

A  thousand  years  before,  such  despotism  might  have  gone 
unchallenged. 

But  much  had  changed  in  this  world,  as  Herod  was  to 

experience  before  the  hour  of  his 
miserable  death. 

The  Romans  had  definitely 
established  order  in  the  lands 
around  the  Mediterranean  Sea. 
At  the  same  time,  the  Greeks 
had  charted  the  unknown  vast¬ 
ness  of  the  soul  and  in  their  sci¬ 
entific  pursuits  had  endeavoured 
to  reach  a  logical  conclusion 
about  the  nature  of  Good  and 
Evil. 

Their  language  (greatly  simplified  for  the  convenience 
of  those  who  lived  abroad)  had  become  the  tongue  of  civilised 
society  in  every  country. 

Even  the  Jews,  with  their  violent  prejudice  against  every¬ 
thing  foreign,  fell  victim  to  the  spell  of  the  handy  Greek 
alphabet. 

Although  the  authors  of  the  four  gospels  were  without 
exception  of  Jewish  parentage,  they  wrote  their  books  in 
Greek  and  not  in  that  Aramaic  vernacular  which  in  turn  had 
taken  the  place  of  the  old  Hebrew  ever  since  the  return  from 
the  Babylonian  exile. 

To  counteract  the  influence  of  Rome  as  the  acknowledged 
centre  of  the  universe,  the  Greeks  of  the  Hellenistic  era  had 


THE  BIRTH  OF  JESUS 


333 


concentrated  their  forces  in  a  rival  city,  called  Alexandria 
after  the  inevitable  Macedonian  hero.  It  was  situated  at  the 
mouth  of  the  river  Nile  and  not  far  removed  from  that  famous 
centre  of  Egyptian  civilisation  which  had  been  dead  for  many 
centuries  before  Jesus  was  born. 

The  Greeks,  brilliant,  unsteady,  but  of  insatiable  curiosity, 
had  carefully  examined  and  clarified  all  human  knowledge. 
Furthermore,  they  had  passed 
through  every  possible  experi¬ 
ence  of  success  and  failure. 

They  could  remember  their 
golden  age  when,  single-handed, 
their  little  cities  had  defeated  the 
hordes  of  the  mighty  Persian 
kings  and  had  saved  Europe 
from  foreign  invasion. 

They  could  recall  (how  could 
they  help  it?)  other  days  when, 
through  their  own  selfishness 
and  greed,  their  country  had  fallen  an  easy  prey  to  the  better 
organised  power  of  Rome. 

But  once  deprived  of  their  political  independence,  the 
Greeks  had  gained  even  greater  fame  as  the  teachers  of 
those  same  Romans  who  had  conquered  them  only  a  few  years 
before. 

And  having  tasted  of  all  the  joys  of  living,  their  wise  men 
had  come  to  the  conclusion  (with  which  we  are  already  familiar 
from  the  author  of  that  book  called  “Ecclesiastes”)  that  all  is 
Vanity  and  that  no  life  can  ever  be  complete  without  that 
spiritual  contentment  which  is  not  based  upon  a  cellar  full  of 
gold  or  an  attic  replete  with  the  riches  of  the  Indies. 

The  Greeks,  who  based  all  their  conclusions  upon  strict 


NAZARETH 


334 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


scientific  reasoning,  did  not  take  much  stock  in  vague  predic¬ 
tions  about  the  future. 

They  called  their  intellectual  leaders  philosophers  or 
‘Triends  of  wisdom”  rather  than  prophets,  as  was  the  common 
use  among  the  Jews. 

There  was,  however,  one  great  point  of  similarity  between 

such  men  as  Socrates  in  Athens 
and  the  LTnknown  Prophet  in 
Babylon. 

They  both  strove  to  do  what¬ 
ever  was  right  according  to  the 
inner  conviction  of  their  own 
souls  without  regard  to  the  prej¬ 
udices  and  the  gossip  of  their 
fellow-townsmen. 

And  they  earnestly  tried  to 
teach  their  own  ideas  about 
righteousness  to  their  neigh¬ 
bours,  that  the  world  in  which  they  found  themselves  might 
become  a  more  humane  and  reasonable  place  of  abode. 

Some  of  them,  like  the  Cynics,  were  as  severe  in  their  prin¬ 
ciples  as  those  Essenes  who  dwelled  in  the  mountains  of 
Judgea. 

Others,  called  the  Epicureans  and  the  Stoics,  were  more 
worldly.  They  taught  their  doctrines  in  the  palace  of  the 
Emperor  and  were  often  used  as  private  tutors  to  the  wealthy 
young  men  of  Rome. 

But  all  of  them  shared  one  common  conviction.  They 
knew  that  happiness  was  entirely  a  matter  of  an  inner  con¬ 
viction  and  not  of  outward  circumstances. 

Under  the  influence  of  these  new  doctrines,  the  old  Greek 
and  Roman  gods  were  rapidly  losing  their  hold  on  the  masses. 


JOSEPH 


THE  BIRTH  OF  JESUS 


335 


First  of  all,  the  upper  classes  deserted  the  ancient  temples. 

Men  hke  Caesar  or  Pompey  still  went  through  all  the  forms 
prescribed  by  the  worship  of  Jupiter,  but  they  regarded  the 
story  about  a  Mighty  Thunderer,  enthroned  high  above  the 
clouds  of  Mount  Olympus,  as  a  fairy  tale  which  might  impress 
little  children  and  the  uneducated  masses  of  the  suburbs  on  the 
other  side  of  the  Tiber.  But 
that  such  fables  should  be  taken 
seriously  by  men  who  had  been 
trained  to  use  their  brains,  that 
seemed  simply  preposterous. 

Of  course,  no  society  has  ever 
been  entirely  composed  of  in- 
telhgent  and  high-thinking  peo¬ 
ple.  From  the  beginning  of  its 
history.  Borne  had  been  full  of 
war-profiteers.  As  the  capital 
of  the  world  for  more  than  three 
centuries,  it  had  attracted  that  strange  international  society 
which  inevitably  drifts  towards  such  cities  as  New  York  or 
London  or  Paris,  where  social  success  is  comparatively  easy 
and  where  no  embarrassing  questions  are  asked  about  one’s 
antecedents. 

The  conquest  of  so  much  new  land  in  Europe  and  western 
Asia  had  turned  many  a  poor  Boman  into  a  rich  country 
squire. 

His  sons  and  daughters,  living  on  the  revenue  of  the  paren¬ 
tal  estates,  had  joined  the  ranks  of  that  smart  society  which 
regarded  religion  as  a  question  of  the  latest  fashion.  They 
found  little  to  attract  them  in  the  simple  and  unostentatious 
doctrines  of  the  Epicureans  and  the  Stoics  (not  to  speak  of 
such  unwashed  monomaniacs  as  Diogenes,  who  insisted  upon 


336 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


living  in  an  old  barrel  for  the  sake  of  greater  convenience). 
They  demanded  something  a  little  more  picturesque  and  per¬ 
haps  not  quite  so  serious.  Something  that  should  appeal  to 
the  imagination  without  interfering  to  any  considerable  extent 
with  the  agreeable  demands  of  daily  life. 

Their  wish  was  fulfilled.  Impostors  and  visionaries  and 
swindlers  and  medicasters  from  all  over  the  world,  from  Egypt 

and  from  Asia  Minor  and  from 
Mesopotamia,  hastened  to  Rome 
and  in  return  for  a  certain  pe¬ 
cuniary  remuneration  preached 
short-cuts  to  happiness  and  sal¬ 
vation  which  would  have  earned 
them  millions  in  our  own  en¬ 
lightened  days. 

They  called  their  spiritual 
quackeries  by  the  dignified  name 
of  ‘"mysteries.” 

They  knew  that  most  men 
(and  most  women)  dearly  love  to  be  the  owners  of  some  secret 
which  they  are  not  obliged  to  share  with  their  neighbours. 

A  Stoic  would  bluntly  state  that  his  rules  of  life  could 
make  all  the  people  of  this  world,  both  rich  and  poor,  white, 
yellow  or  black,  happy  and  contented  and  virtuous. 

The  shrewd  possessors  of  the  invisible  knowledge  upon 
which  the  wonderful  Oriental  mysteries  were  based  never  made 
that  mistake. 

They  were  very  exclusive. 

They  appealed  only  to  small  groups  and  sold  their  wares 
dearly. 

They  did  not  preach  under  the  high  dome  of  Heaven,  which 
was  free  to  all.  They  withdrew  to  a  badly  lighted  little  room, 


MARY 


THE  BIRTH  OF  JESUS 


337 


filled  with  the  smell  of  incense  and  with  strange  pictures. 
There  they  performed  that  wonderful  hocus-pocus  which  never 
fails  to  impress  the  half -educated. 

Undoubtedly  a  few  of  those  new  missionaries  were  honest. 
They  believed  in  their  own  visions  and  actually  thought  that 
they  heard  those  voices  which  spoke  to  them  in  the  dark  and 
which  brought  them  messages 
from  the  other  world.  But  the 
great  majority  was  composed  of 
clever  adventurers  who  fooled 
their  public  because  that  public 
insisted  upon  being  fooled  and 
paid  well  for  the  privilege. 

For  quite  a  long  time  they 
were  very  successful.  The  com¬ 
petition  in  mysteries  was  almost 
as  eager  as  that  among  the  palm¬ 
ists  and  horoscope  professors  of 
our  modern  cities.  Then  there 
was  a  sudden  slump.  The  public  was  growing  tired  of  this 
novelty,  and  its  indifference  was  the  result  of  certain  out¬ 
ward  changes  which  were  taking  place  in  the  Empire. 

Usually  the  happiness  of  a  people  is  in  inverse  ratio  to 
their  riches.  When  they  grow  rich  and  prosperous  beyond  a 
certain  definite  point,  they  begin  to  lose  interest  in  those  simple 
pleasures  without  which  life  becomes  a  vast  span  of  boredom 
which  stretches  from  the  cradle  to  the  grave. 

The  Empire  was  perhaps  the  best  example  of  this  historical 
axiom.  To  a  rapidly  increasing  number  of  Homans,  existence 
became  a  burden.  They  had  eaten  too  much  and  drunk  too 
much  and  enjoyed  too  many  pleasures  to  get  the  slightest  sat- 


ON  THE  WAY  TO  BETH¬ 
LEHEM 


338 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


isf action  out  of  normal  human  experiences.  They  asked  for 
a  solution  of  their  problems  and  they  received  no  answer. 

The  old  Gods  failed  them. 

The  dispensers  of  the  new  Truth  failed  them. 

The  learned  doctors  connected  with  the  worship  of  Isis  and 
Mithras  and  Bacchus  failed  them. 

Nothing  was  left  but  despair. 

And  then  Jesus  was  born. 

^  ^ 

It  was  the  fourth  year  before  the  beginning  of  our  era. 

On  the  sloping  hillside  of  a 
quiet  valley  in  Galilee  stood  the 
village  of  Nazareth. 

There  lived  Joseph  the  car¬ 
penter  and  his  wife  Mary. 

They  were  not  rich,  and  they 
were  not  poor. 

They  were  just  like  all  their 
neighbours. 

They  worked  hard  and  they 
told  their  children  that  the 
world  expected  something  of 
them  as  both  their  parents  were  descended  from  King  David, 
who,  as  they  all  knew,  was  a  great-great -grandson  of  the  gentle 
Ruth,  whose  story  was  well  known  to  all  Jewish  boys  and  girls. 

Joseph  was  a  simple  man  who  had  never  been  outside  of  his 
own  country,  but  Mary  had  once  spent  quite  a  long  time  in 
that  big  city  called  Jerusalem. 

This  had  happened  while  she  was  still  engaged  to  Joseph. 

Mary  had  a  cousin,  by  the  name  of  Elisabeth,  who  had 
been  married  to  a  certain  Zacharias,  a  priest  connected  with 
the  service  of  the  Temple. 


THE  BIRTH  OF  JESUS 


339 


Both  Zacharias  and  Elisabeth  were  old  folk  and  they  were 
quite  sad  because  they  never  had  had  any  children. 

But  behold  one  day  Mary  heard  from  Elisabeth,  There 
was  to  be  a  baby  in  the  family, 
and  could  Mary  come  and  take 
care  of  her  kinswoman?  for  there 
was  a  lot  of  work  to  be  done  and 
Elisabeth  needed  a  little  at¬ 
tention. 

Mary  went  to  Juttah,  the 
suburb  of  Jerusalem  in  which 
her  people  lived,  and  stayed 
there  until  her  little  cousin  John 
lay  safely  tucked  away  in  his 
cradle. 

Then  she  returned  to  Nazareth  where  she  was  to  marry 
Joseph. 

But  ere  long  she  had  been  called  upon  to  undertake  another 
journey. 

In  distant  Jerusalem,  wicked  Herod  was  still  King. 

But  his  days  were  numbered  and  his  power  was  waning. 

In  stiU  more  distant  Rome,  Caesar  Augustus  had  taken  hold 
of  the  reins  of  government  and  had  turned  the  Republic  into 
an  Empire. 

Empires  cost  money  and  subjects  must  pay. 

Therefore  almighty  Csesar  had  decreed  that  all  his  beloved 
children  from  east  and  west  and  north  and  south  should  duly 
enroll  their  names  upon  certain  official  registers  that  hence¬ 
forth  the  tax-gatherers  might  know  who  had  paid  their  just 
shares  of  all  dues  and  who  had  failed  to  do  their  duty. 

It  is  true,  both  Judsea  and  Galilee  were  still  nominally  part 
of  an  independent  kingdom.  But  when  it  came  to  a  question 


THE  SHEPHERDS 


340 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


of  revenue,  the  Homans  were  apt  to  stretch  a  point  or  two, 
and  far  and  wide  the  order  went  forth  that  the  people  must 
present  themselves  at  a  given  date  at  the  particular  spot  which 
happened  to  be  the  original  home  of  their  family  or  tribe. 

Joseph,  as  a  descendant  of  David,  therefore  had  trav¬ 
elled  to  Bethlehem  and  his  wife, 
faithful  Mary,  had  gone  with 
him. 

It  had  been  no  easy  journey. 
The  road  had  been  long  and 
tiring. 

And  when  at  last  Joseph  and 
Mary  had  reached  Bethlehem, 
all  the  rooms  in  the  city  had 
already  been  occupied  by  those 
who  had  arrived  earlier. 

It  had  been  a  very  cold  night. 

Kind  people  had  taken  pity  upon  the  poor  young  wife. 

They  had  made  her  a  bed  in  the  corner  of  an  old  stable. 

And  there  Jesus  had  been  born,  while  outside  in  the  fields, 
the  shepherds  were  guarding  their  flocks  against  thieves  and 
wolves,  and  were  wondering  when  the  long-promised  Messiah 
should  set  their  unhappy  land  free  from  those  foreign  masters 
who  mocked  at  the  power  of  Jehovah  and  laughed  at  all  that 
was  sacred  to  the  heart  of  the  Jews. 

All  this  had  occurred  long  ago. 

It  was  rarely  mentioned,  for  it  had  been  followed  by  that 
hasty  and  terrible  flight  into  the  wilderness,  which  had  been 
caused  by  the  cruelty  of  Herod  the  King. 

One  evening,  Mary  had  been  nursing  her  baby  in  front 
of  the  old  stable  which  served  her  and  Joseph  as  a  home. 

Suddenly  there  had  been  a  great  noise  in  the  street. 


THE  ADORATION 


■j'  O''  ■  ■  .  ■ 

1  ,  it?  -  ■■ 


BETHLEHEM 


*•  * 


/ 


H  I 


C 


V 


) 


•  .:n-7 


,'uH-' 


THE  BIRTH  OF  JESUS 


341 


A  caravan  of  Persian  travellers  was  passing  by. 

With  their  camels  and  their  servants  and  their  rich  clothes 
and  their  golden  rings  and  the  bright  colours  of  their  turbans, 
they  were  a  sight  which  brought  all  the  village  to  its  wondering 
doorsteps. 

The  young  mother  and  her  child  had  attracted  the  attention 
of  these  strange  men.  They  had 
halted  their  camels  and  they  had 
played  with  the  little  boy  and 
then,  when  they  left,  they  had 
given  his  pretty  mother  some 
presents  from  among  their  bales 
of  silk  and  their  boxes  of  spices. 

All  this  had  been  innocent 
enough,  but  Judaea  was  a  very 
small  country,  and  news  trav¬ 
elled  fast. 

In  Jerusalem,  in  his  gloomy 
palace,  Herod  was  sitting  in  dark  dread  of  the  future.  He  was 
old  and  he  was  sick  and  he  was  verv  miserable. 

The  memory  of  his  murdered  wife  was  forever  with  him. 

The  shadows  were  falling  fast. 

Suspicion  was  the  companion  of  his  last  days,  and  fear 
for  ever  followed  him  with  silent  tread. 

When  his  officers  began  to  talk  about  the  visit  of  the  Persian 
merchants  to  Bethlehem,  Herod  became  panic-stricken.  Like 
all  men  of  that  age,  the  King  of  Judaea  firmly  believed  that  the 
dark-skinned  Magi  could  perform  such  miracles  as  had  not  been 
seen  since  the  wondrous  days  of  Elijah  and  Elisha. 

They  could  not  be  just  ordinary  merchants.  They  must 
have  some  special  mission.  Were  they  to  avenge  the  evil 
deeds  of  the  usurper  who  now  sat  on  the  throne,  which  cen- 


HEROD’S  GLOOMY  PALACE 


342 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


turies  before  had  belonged  to  David,  a  native  of  that  selfsame 
village  of  Bethlehem  where  the  Magi  had  created  such  a  stir? 

King  Herod  had  asked  for  details.  He  had  heard  of  many 
other  strange  occurrences  in  connection  with  the  mysterious 
child. 

A  short  time  after  his  birth,  the  boy,  being  the  oldest  son, 
had  been  taken  to  the  Temple,  and  there,  when  the  offering  had 
been  completed,  an  old  man  by  the  name  of  Simeon,  and  a  very 

old  prophetess  called  Anna,  had 
spoken  strange  words  about  the 
coming  of  the  day  of  deliverance, 
and  Simeon  had  asked  Jehovah 
to  let  him  die  in  peace  now  that 
he  had  seen  the  Messiah  who 
should  lead  his  people  back  from 
the  path  of  wickedness  and  de¬ 
pravity. 

Whether  all  this  was  true  or 
not  did  not  interest  Herod.  It 
had  been  said  and  it  was  being 
believed  by  great  numbers  of  people.  That  was  enough. 
Herod  had  given  orders  that  all  boys  born  in  Bethlehem  within 
the  last  three  years  should  be  killed. 

In  this  way  he  had  hoped  to  rid  himself  of  any  possible 
rival  for  his  throne.  But  the  plan  had  not  been  entirely  suc¬ 
cessful. 

Several  of  the  parents,  warned  by  the  officers  or  by  their 
friends  in  Jerusalem,  had  been  able  to  escape.  Mary  and 
Joseph  had  gone  southward  and  tradition  (which  loved  to 
connect  the  early  story  of  Jesus  with  that  of  Abraham 
and  Joseph)  long  maintained  that  they  had  gone  as  far  as 
Egypt. 


THE  BIRTH  OF  JESUS 


343 


As  soon  as  the  massacre  had  come  to  an  end  by  the  welcome 
death  of  Herod,  they  had  returned  to  Nazareth. 

Joseph  once  more  had 
opened  his  carpenter  shop  and 
Mary  found  her  hands  busy 
tending  the  ever  increasing 
nursery. 

For  she  became  the  mother 
of  four  other  boys  who  were 
called  James  and  Joseph  and 
Simon  and  Judas,  and  of  sev¬ 
eral  girls,  who  lived  to  see 
the  triumph  and  the  death  of 
that  strange  older  brother  who 

was  to  include  all  mankind  in  the  tender  affection  which  he 
had  learned  at  the  knees  of  his  mother. 


MURDER  IN  BETHLEHEM 


JOHN  THE  BAPTIST 


CHAPTER  XXI 

THE  PROPHETIC  SPIRIT  HAD  NOT  YET  DIED  OUT  AMONG 
THE  JEWS,  FOR  DURING  THE  DAYS  OF  JESUS’  YOUTH, 
A  MAN  BY  THE  NAME  OF  JOHN  (OR  JOHN  THE  BAP¬ 
TIST,  AS  WE  CAME  TO  KNOW  HIM)  WAS  WARNING  THE 
PEOPLE  IN  A  THUNDEROUS  VOICE  TO  REPENT  OF 
THEIR  CRIMES  AND  OF  THEIR  SINS.  THE  JEWS  HAD 
NO  IDEA  OF  CHANGING  THEIR  WAYS.  WHEN  JOHN 
CONTINUED  TO  BOTHER  THE  PEOPLE  OF  JUD^A 
WITH  HIS  SERMONS  AND  EXHORTATIONS,  HEROD 
THE  KING  ORDERED  HIM  TO  BE  KILLED 

EROD  was  dead  and  Augustus  was 
dead,  and  Jesus  had  grown  to  man¬ 
hood  and  was  living  peacefully  in 
Nazareth. 

Much  had  happened  since  the  days 
of  his  childhood. 

The  division  of  the  many  posses¬ 
sions  of  Herod,  who  had  been  married 
ten  times,  had  caused  very  considerable  difficulty. 

Originally,  the  number  of  his  children  had  been  very  large, 
but  murder  and  execution  had  brought  down  the  number  of 
possible  candidates  to  just  four. 

344 


JOHN  THE  BAPTIST  345 

The  Romans,  however,  had  refused  to  listen  to  the  rival 
claims  of  the  ambitious  heirs. 

They  had  divided  the  domains  of  Herod  into  three  unequal 
parts  and  had  given  these  to  such  candidates  as  best  suited 
the  momentary  political  need  of  the  Empire. 

The  largest  share,  almost  one-half,  including  Judaea,  had 
gone  to  Archelaus,  the  oldest  son.  Galilee  and  most  of  the 
northern  territory  had  been  given  to  Herod  Antipas,  who  was 
a  brother  of  Archelaus  by  the  same  Samaritan  mother.  What 
remained,  a  very  negligible  strip  of  land,  had  gone  to  a  certain 
Philip  who  does  not  seem  to  have  been  a  relative  of  Herod  at 
all,  but  who  happened  to  enjoy  the  particular  favour  of  the 
Romans.  On  account  of  his  name,  which  was  very  common  in 
those  days,  he  has  caused  the  historians  a  great  deal  of  trouble. 

And  to  make  matters  worse,  there  was  another  Philip, 
usually  called  Philip  Herod  after  his  father,  who  was  married 
to  a  certain  Herodias,  the  daughter  of  the  first  Herod’s  half- 
brother  Aristobulus.  Herodias  in  turn  became  the  mother  of 
a  girl  called  Salome,  and  this  same  Salome  eventually  seems 
to  have  married  that  Philip  who  ruled  the  country  towards  the 
north  of  the  Sea  of  Galilee. 

A  few  years  afterwards,  all  these  Philips  and  Herods  were 
to  play  leading  roles  in  a  most  atrocious  family  scandal  which 
indirectly  caused  the  untimely  death  of  John  the  Baptist.  That 
is  the  only  reason  why  they  are  mentioned  here  at  all. 

To  make  this  long  and  complicated  chapter  as  short  as  pos¬ 
sible,  the  spoils  of  old  Herod  had  been  divided,  the  ever  patient 
subjects  had  welcomed  their  new  masters,  and  Tiberius,  the 
Emperor,  had  given  instructions  to  his  procurator  in  Judaea 
to  keep  a  discreet  but  watchful  eye  upon  all  further  develop¬ 
ments  within  this  turbulent  bailiwick. 

'The  name  of  that  procurator  has  come  down  to  us. 


346 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


I  _ 

He  was  called  Pontius  Pilatus  (or  Pilate,  as  we  say)  and 
he  was  the  personal  representative  of  the  Emperor  in  one  of 
those  provinces  which  paid  their  taxes  directly  to  His  Majesty 
and  not  to  the  Senate. 

It  is  difficult  to  describe  the  position  of  Pilate  in  terms 
which  mean  anything  to  modern  people. 

But  a  condition  similar  to  that  in  Judgea  still  prevails  in 
several  parts  of  the  British  and  the  Dutch  colonies.  Many 
districts  in  the  Indies  continue  to  be  ruled  by  so-called  inde¬ 
pendent  sultans  and  chieftains,  who  go  through  the  formality 
of  commanding  their  body-guards  and  promulgating  laws, 
although  they  are  deprived  of  all  actual  power  and  are  com¬ 
pletely  at  the  mercy  of  their  foreign  masters. 

For  reasons  of  policy  it  has  seemed  expedient  not  to  annex 
such  territories  and  they  have  been  left  an  outward  semblance 
of  self-government.  But  a  ‘^governor”  or  a  “resident”  or  a 
“consul-general”  is  maintained  in  the  capital  of  the  national 
sovereign.  He  superintends  the  acts  of  the  King  and  those 
of  his  ministers.  As  long  as  the  latter  follow  his  tactful  sug¬ 
gestions,  they  are  allowed  to  continue  to  hold  office.  But 
Heaven  help  them  if  they  forget  that  they  are  subordinate  of¬ 
ficers  of  an  invisible  but  ever  watchful  power.  His  Excel¬ 
lency  the  Governor,  in  unmistakable  terms,  gives  expression  to 
his  respectful  discontent.  And  if  he  has  reason  to  feel  that 
his  first  warning  has  fallen  upon  deaf  ears,  there  is  a  sudden 
stir  in  the  dock-yards  of  the  home  country,  and  soon  after¬ 
wards  a  lonely,  dark-skinned  exile  is  rowed  to  the  silent  shore 
of  a  distant  island. 

Pontius  Pilate  was  the  unfortunate  official  whose  duty  it 
was  to  exercise  such  hidden  but  ever  evident  authority  among 
the  Jews.  His  territory  was  quite  large,  and  only  once  each 
year  (and  sometimes  less)  did  he  find  occasion  to  leave  Caesarea 


JOHN  THE  BAPTIST 


347 


on  the  coast  and  come  to  Jerusalem.  He  timed  his  visits  in 
such  a  way  that  he  should  be  present  at  the  great  Jewish  fes¬ 
tival.  He  could  then  meet  all  the  district  leaders  without  wast¬ 
ing  his  time  travelling  from  one  village  to  another.  He  could 
hear  their  complaints  and  could  offer  his  suggestions  and  in 
case  of  trouble  (which  was  always  possible  among  the  highly 
excitable  masses  of  the  old  capi¬ 
tal)  he  could  personally  superin¬ 
tend  those  measures  which  had 
to  be  taken  to  re-establish  order. 

The  procurator  had  no  pal¬ 
ace  of  his  own  in  the  capital. 

Whenever  he  came  to  town,  he 
occupied  one  wing  of  the  royal 
palace.  The  owner  of  that  an¬ 
cient  edifice  probably  did  not 
like  this  arrangement,  but  the 
austere  and  abrupt  Roman  offi¬ 
cial  was  no  more  interested  in  the  private  views  of  a  Jewish 
king  than  the  Governor  General  of  India  is  disturbed  by  the 
personal  preferences  of  an  humble  Mohammedan  prince  who 
thus  far  has  escaped  direct  annexation  at  the  hands  of  the 
British. 

Besides,  Herod  knew  exactly  how  he  could  get  rid  of  his 
unwelcome  guest  in  the  shortest  possible  time. 

Provided  that  all  the  taxes  had  been  duly  paid  up  and  that 
the  roads  had  been  kept  free  from  robbers  and  that  the  personal 
differences  of  the  religious  leaders  in  the  great  council  had 
not  led  to  civil  war,  the  procurator  was  more  than  willing  to 
leave  the  capital  almost  as  soon  as  he  had  entered  it. 

Like  many  other  Roman  institutions,  this  dual  form  of  gov¬ 
ernment  was  by  no  means  ideal.  But  it  worked,  and  that  was 


348 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


all  the  conquerors  wanted.  They  cheerfully  left  the  theory  of 
government  to  those  Greek  publicists  who  were  interested  in 
that  sort  of  thing,  and  themselves  stuck  to  the  prosaic  facts 
of  daily  life.  As  they  were  usually  successful  along  these  prac¬ 
tical  lines,  the  world  accepted  their  rough-and-ready  methods 
as  the  most  practical  solution  that  had  as  yet  been  offered  by 
any  race  of  men. 

And  now,  behold !  just  when  everything  was  going  smoothly, 
the  peace  of  Judsea  was  rudely  upset  by  the  sudden  and  most 
inconvenient  appearance  of  a  wild  man  from  the  desert. 

To  the  people  who  lived  west  of  the  river  Jordan,  the  Es- 
senes,  who  despised  all  worldly  possessions  and  loved  to  acquire 
holiness  in  the  lonely  desert,  were  an  old  story.  They  were 
harmless  folk,  who  kept  to  their  own  little  settlement  and  who 
rarely  ventured  forth  into  the  villages  and  never  into  the  towns, 
where  had  people  were  buying  and  selling  things  and  growing 
rich  without  a  thought  of  that  hereafter  which  so  greatly  wor¬ 
ried  the  pious  hermits.  But  the  new  prophet,  although  he 
dressed  and  lived  like  an  Essene,  did  not  in  the  least  share  their 
proverbial  sh5niess.  He  went  up  and  down  the  valley  of  the 
Jordan,  indulging  in  that  sort  of  religious  exhortation  which 
the  modern  world  associates  with  the  revival  meetings  which 
were  so  popular  a  few  years  ago. 

When  people  refused  to  agree  with  him,  he  denounced  them 
in  terms  that  could  not  possibly  be  mistaken. 

Soon  there  were  clashes  between  him  and  the  Sadducees. 
This  was  deplorable,  for  a  breach  of  the  common  peace  meant 
official  reports  from  Palestine  to  Rome  and  commissions  of 
inquiry  from  Rome  to  Palestine  and  perhaps  a  change  of  gov¬ 
ernment  which  would  make  the  King  of  Judasa  an  exile,  pass¬ 
ing  his  embittered  days  in  a  Roman  city  or  in  a  far  hamlet  on 
the  shores  of  the  Black  Sea. 


JOHN  THE  BAPTIST 


349 


Before  the  procurator  in  distant  Csesarea  therefore  could 
hear  of  the  trouble,  the  strong  arm  of  the  law  was  invoked 
against  the  religious  firebrand,  who  dared  to  upset  the  peace 
and  quiet  of  the  land. 

And  behold!  the  man  proved  to  be  the  son  of  Zacharias  and 
Elisabeth,  the  little  boy  who  was  born  while  Mary  was  visiting 
the  old  couple  some  thirty  years 
before. 

John  (who  was  just  twelve 
months  older  than  Jesus)  had 
been  a  very  serious  child.  At  an 
early  age  he  left  his  home  and 
had  gone  into  the  desert  to  con¬ 
template  holiness  on  the  lonely 
shores  of  the  Dead  Sea. 

Far  away  from  the  turmoil 
of  the  farm  and  the  factory,  he 
thought  deeply  upon  the  wicked¬ 
ness  of  that  world,  of  which,  truth  to  tell,  he  knew  nothing. 

He  himself  was  without  desires  and  without  needs. 

An  old  shirt  made  of  camel’s  hair  was  his  only  possession. 

He  ate  the  simplest  food  and  only  just  enough  to  keep 
him  alive. 

He  read  no  books  but  those  written  by  his  ancestors,  and 
knew  nothing  of  what  had  been  said  or  thought  or  done  by  the 
more  civilised  people  of  the  Near-West. 

He  served  Jehovah  with  an  absolute  and  unswerving  loyalty 
and  soon  began  to  compare  himself  to  Elijah  and  to  Jeremiah 
and  to  the  other  great  leaders  of  his  race.  He  himself  was 
good  and  he  wanted  all  the  world  to  share  his  virtues.  And 
when  he  saw  the  harm  done  by  old  Herod  and  his  terrible 
sons,  and  noticed  the  lukewarm  allegiance  of  his  fellow  men 


350 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


to  the  laws  of  their  fathers,  he  felt  it  his  duty  to  go  forth  and 
tell  the  people  of  Judaea  of  certain  things  which  they  ought  to 
know  and  which,  unfortunately,  they  seemed  to  have  forgotten 
long  ago. 

His  uncouth  appearance  and  the  violence  of  his  language 
caused  large  crowds  to  gather  wherever  he  made  his  appear¬ 
ance. 


THE  DEAD  SEA 


Dirty  and  unkempt,  a  long  wild  beard  flowing  in  the  wind, 
his  arms  waving  excitedly  as  he  spoke  of  the  coming  day  of 
Judgment,  John  was  a  man  to  inspire  fear  and  doubt  in  the 
heart  of  the  most  hardened  sinner. 

Soon  the  crowds  began  to  whisper  to  each  other  that  this 
man  was  none  other  than  the  long-expected  Messiah. 

But  he  would  not  hear  of  that. 

He  was  not  the  Messiah.  Jehovah  had  merely  sent  him 
to  prepare  for  the  day  when  the  real  Messiah  should  come. 

But  the  people,  who  dearly  love  a  mystery,  would  not  be- 


THE  UNKNOWN  PROPHET 


■  v^ 


'  ■  ‘’j?  V  - 

.*•-  r.^,: ' 


..  / 


•.:  >V^r^ 

%  '* 


■'■»~^  :>•  --t:  >1;, , , 


5-^ 


•  •  r^  '. 

-  •  '=^ . ' 


'^-  ^  -  ■•' !’,.  ■  ■'4*1. 

,-  *■  i 


.  \ 


' '  -  •  ,l  .;>  : 


.•,;'-r*^  r  ►'• 


r  >,r^ 


j:. . 


..  .‘  X 


A'  V -,  :  ■'v;.  •  •  ' :.  - 


<V- 


.  y^.*.-  ■■  -•  T.- 


. 


.  ■  V  y , '  ■  -  <  ’  '-A'ySvyyyr^  ^■.- 

■  ■■■'A. 

'..  -.<  •  •,  '.>v  -NTV^li^  .  •3,-.  '  .-■*  •  V  f '  '•  ® '.'  W I  Jl 


JOHN  THE  BAPTIST 


351 


lieve  this  simple  statement.  If  this  man  were  not  the  Mes¬ 
siah,  he  was  at  least  the  prophet  Elijah,  come  back  to  this 
earth  to  perform  some  more  of  his  miracles. 

But  that  too  John  denied. 

He  stuck  closely  to  the  role 
himself.  He  was  but  a  humble 
messenger  from  Heaven,  com¬ 
manded  to  bring  tidings  of  de¬ 
spair  and  of  hope. 

In  the  meantime,  and  while 
waiting  for  the  day  when  all  peo¬ 
ple  should  be  forced  to  undergo 
the  final  baptism  of  fire  (to 
cleanse  them  of  their  sins)  he 
was  willing  to  baptise  those  who 
showed  signs  of  repentance  with 
the  water  of  the  river  as  a  to¬ 
ken  of  their  renewed  faith  in  the  power  of  Jehovah. 

The  Judseans  were  greatly  impressed.  John’s  fame  rapidly 
spread  from  village  to  village  and  from  far  and  wide  the  Jews 
came  to  see  and  hear  and  received  baptism  at  the  hands  of  their 
strange  new  Prophet. 

At  last  the  news  of  John’s  successful  career  reached  Galilee. 

There  in  his  home  at  Nazareth,  Jesus  had  been  living  the 
peaceful  existence  of  a  carpenter’s  apprentice. 

At  the  age  of  twelve  his  parents  had  taken  him  to  Jeru¬ 
salem,  to  keep  the  feast  of  the  Passover.  The  visit  to  the 
Temple  had  made  a  deep  impression  upon  the  boy.  As  soon 
as  the  necessary  ceremonies  had  been  finished,  Mary  and  Joseph 
had  returned  northward.  Jesus  was  not  with  them  but  they 
thought  that  he  had  joined  another  group  of  Nazarenes  and 
would  probably  turn  up  in  the  evening. 


which  he  had  selected  for 


JOHN  THE  BAPTIST 


352 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


But  when  night  came,  their  son  was  still  missing  and  no 
one  had  seen  him.  Joseph  and  Mary  feared  an  accident  and 
went  back  to  Jerusalem  as  rapidly  as  they  could. 

After  a  day  of  searching,  they  found  Jesus  in  the  Temple, 
where  he  was  engaged  in  a  deep  religious  discussion  with  a 
crowd  of  rabbis. 

When  Jesus  saw  how  greatly  he  had  frightened  his  poor 


mother,  he  had  promised  that  he 
would  never  run  away  again. 


But  now  he  was  grown  up 
and  he  was  very  much  interested 
in  the  questions  of  the  day  and 
when  he  heard  of  John  (who  by 
now  was  generally  spoken  of  as 
John  the  Baptist)  he  left  Xaza- 
reth  and  went  on  foot  to  the 
Dead  Sea  and  joined  the  crowds 
which  were  forever  at  the  heels 
of  the  grim  prophet,  clamouring 


JESUS  IN  THE  WILDERNESS 


loudly  to  be  immersed  beneath  the  muddy  waters  of  the  river 
Jordan. 

The  sight  of  his  cousin  moved  Jesus  strangely. 

Here  at  last  was  a  man  who  had  the  courage  of  his  con¬ 
victions. 

John’s  manners  and  his  method  of  attack  were  not  exactly 
to  his  taste. 

But  Jesus  had  grown  up  amidst  the  pleasant  meadows  of 
the  north  and  John  was  the  product  of  the  barren  farms  of  the 
south,  and  these  early  associations  had  put  their  stamp  upon 
the  characters  of  the  two  cousins. 

Jesus  felt  that  John  could  teach  him  much.  He  too  asked 
to  be  baptised  and  then,  after  a  short  while,  he  decided  to  go 


JOHN  THE  BAPTIST 


353 


into  the  wilderness  that  he  too  might  find  his  soul  in  solitude. 

When  he  came  back,  the  career  of  John  was  rapidly  coming 
to  an  end  and  thereafter  the  two  men  met  only  on  rare  oc¬ 
casions. 

It  was  not  the  fault  of  Jesus,  but  a  result  of  certain  cir¬ 
cumstances  over  which  he  had  no  control. 

As  long  as  the  Baptist  had  merely  spoken  of  the  approach¬ 
ing  Kingdom  of  Heaven,  the  authorities  had  not  bothered  him. 
But  when  he  began  to  criticise  the  more  tangible  Kingdom  of 
Judsea,  it  was  a  very  different  matter. 

Unfortunately,  John  had  excellent  reason  to  find  fault  with 
the  private  life  of  his  sovereign. 

Herod,  the  Tetrarch,  was  a  chip 
off  the  old  block. 

When  he  and  his  half-brother 
Philip  had  been  called  to  Home 
on  some  political  business,  he  had 
fallen  desperately  in  love  with  his 
brother’s  wife,  Herodias. 

Herodias,  who  cared  not  at 
all  for  her  own  husband,  was 
quite  willing  to  marry  Herod 
provided  he  (Herod)  first  di¬ 
vorce  his  own  wife,  who  happened  to  be  an  Arab  woman  from 
the  famous  city  of  Petra. 

In  Rome,  in  those  days,  all  things  could  be  arranged,  pro¬ 
vided  one  was  very  rich,  and  the  divorce  had  been  procured. 

Herod  had  taken  Herodias  as  his  queen  and  Salome,  the 
daughter  of  Herodias,  had  gone  to  live  with  her  stepfather. 

The  people  of  Galilee  and  Judsea  had  been  greatly  shocked 
at  this  callous  arrangement.  But  they  wisely  kept  their  own 
counsel  and  did  not  express  their  opinions  too  loudly  where 


THE  UNDERGROUND 
DUNGEON 


354.  THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

the  soldiers  of  the  King  were  near  at  hand  and  could  overhear 
them. 

John,  however,  conscious  of  his  high  duty  as  a  minister  of 
Jehovah’s  will,  found  it  impossible  to  remain  silent  before  so 
wicked  a  deed. 

He  denounced  Herod  and  Herodias  wherever  and  whenever 
he  could. 

In  time,  his  fulminations  might  have  incensed  the  people 

to  such  an  extent  that  riots  would 
have  taken  place,  and  this,  of 
course,  the  authorities  were 
obliged  to  prevent  at  all  cost. 

Orders  were  given  for  the 
arrest  of  John. 

Even  then  the  prophet  re¬ 
fused  to  keep  quiet.  From  the 
bottom  of  his  dark  dungeon  he 
continued  to  thunder  away 
against  the  royal  couple  who  in 
his  eyes  were  no  better  than  com¬ 
mon  adulterers. 

The  Tetrarch  was  in  a  difficult  position.  He  had  a  whole¬ 
some  dread  of  the  mysterious  power  of  this  unknown  man. 

But  he  feared  his  wife’s  sharp  tongue  more. 

One  day  he  was  going  to  have  J ohn  executed.  The  next 
day  he  relented  and  offered  clemency  if  John  would  only 
promise  to  keep  quiet. 

At  last  Herodias  grew  tired  and  decided  to  make  an  end 
of  all  further  hesitation.  She  knew  of  her  husband’s  great 
admiration  for  his  stepdaughter  Salome.  The  girl  was  a  very 
graceful  dancer  and  Herod  loved  to  watch  her. 

She  told  her  daughter  that  she  must  not  dance  at  court, 


JOHN  WAS  TAKEN  OUT  OF 
HIS  DUNGEON 


JOHN  THE  BAPTIST  355 

unless  the  King  promised  to  give  her  whatever  she  should  ask 
for. 

Herod  rashly  said  ‘‘Yes/’  and  then  Salome,  following  the 
urging  of  her  mother,  demanded  the  head  of  John  the  Baptist. 

The  stepfather,  repenting  of  his  folly,  offered  her  his  whole 
kingdom  if  she  would  release  him  of  his  oath.  But  mother  and 
daughter  remained  steadfast  and  John  was  condemned  to  be 
killed. 

The  executioner  clambered  down  into  the  pit  where  the 
prophet  lay  chained.  A  minute  later  the  head  of  John  was 
handed  to  the  frightened  Salome. 

Such  was  the  death  of  John,  who  had  dared  to  speak  of 
serious  things  to  a  world  which  only  cared  to  be  amused. 


THE  CHILDHOOD  OF  JESUS 


CHAPTER  XXII 

AS  FOR  JESUS,  HE  GREW  UP  AMONG  THE  SIMPLE  PEAS¬ 
ANTS  AND  ARTISANS  OF  A  LITTLE  VILLAGE  CALLED 
NAZARETH.  HE  WAS  TAUGHT  THE  TRADE  OF  A  CAR¬ 
PENTER,  BUT  THIS  LIFE  DID  NOT  SATISFY  HIM.  HE 
LOOKED  UPON  THE  WORLD  AND  FOUND  IT  FULL  OF 
CRUELTY  AND  INJUSTICE.  HE  LEFT  HIS  FATHER 
AND  HIS  MOTHER  AND  HIS  BROTHERS  AND  HIS  SIS¬ 
TERS,  AND  WENT  FORTH  TO  TELL  OF  THOSE  THINGS 
WHICH  IN  HIS  HEART  HE  HELD  TO  BE  TRUE 

ESUS  spent  only  a  short  while  in  the 
wilderness. 

During  that  time  he  rarely  ate  or 
slept. 

And  well  might  he  need  all  his 
hours  to  plan  the  future. 

He  was  almost  thirty  years  old,  un¬ 
married,  free  to  come  and  go  and  live 
according  to  the  very  simple  standards  of  his  day. 

But  the  words  of  John  had  set  him  thinking.  All  the  im¬ 
pressions  and  experiences  of  his  quiet  and  uneventful  exist¬ 
ence  in  Nazareth  seemed  to  lead  up  to  that  moment  near  the 

356 


THE  CHILDHOOD  OF  JESUS 


357 


river  Jordan  when  he  had  suddenly  asked  himself  the  question, 
“What  does  life  really  mean?” 

He  knew  little  of  the  great  political  events  which  had  just 
turned  the  old  Roman  Republic  into  an  Empire  based  upon 
the  strength  and  the  loyalty  of  a  few  regiments  of  highly  paid 
mercenaries. 

Of  the  Greek  language  and  of  everything  that  had  been 
written  in  that  tongue,  he  was  profoundly  ignorant. 

He  spoke  Aramaic  and  probably  had  a  reading  knowledge 
of  the  ancient  Hebrew  tongue  in  which  the  holy  books  had  been 
written,  many  centuries  ago. 

But  Greek  thought  and  Greek  science  meant  as  little  to 
him  as  Roman  jurisprudence  and  Roman  statecraft. 

He  was  withal  a  child  of  his  own  people  and  his  own  age — 
a  humble  Jewish  carpenter,  steeped  in  the  knowledge  of  the 
old  Mosaic  laws  and  the  traditions  of  the  Judges  and  the 
Prophets,  of  whom  he  had  heard  in  the  synagogues  and  in  the 
Temple. 

He  was  very  faithful  in  his  religious  duties. 

Whenever  it  was  necessary,  he  went  to  Jerusalem,  that  he 
might  give  burnt  offering  in  the  Temple,  as  it  was  required 
by  ancient  usage. 

He  accepted  his  little  Galilean  world  as  he  found  it  and 
did  not  question  what  Joseph  and  Mary  had  taught  him. 

And  yet  he  was  not  without  certain  doubts. 

He  was  not  like  other  people. 

He  felt  within  himself  a  certain  spiritual  quahty  which  set 
him  apart  from  other  men.  The  good  neighbours  of  Nazareth 
hardly  noticed  this.  They  knew  him  too  intimately.  To  them 
he  always  was  the  carpenter’s  son. 

But  once  he  left  his  native  village,  it  was  different. 

He  was  pointed  out. 


358 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


There  was  something  in  his  eye,  in  his  gesture,  which  at¬ 
tracted  the  attention  of  the  casual  passer-by.  And  when  he 
reached  the  river  Jordan  where  the  crowd  lived  in  momentary 
expectation  of  a  great  miracle,  he  heard  how  the  followers  of 
the  Baptist  whispered  behind  his  back  and  asked  each  other 
the  oft-repeated  question:  ‘Ts  that  the  man  who  is  to  be  our 
Messiah?” 

But  the  Messiah,  to  those  who  flocked  together  to  hear 
the  sermons  of  John,  was  a  great  warrior  and  a  stern  judge— 
a  sort  of  imperial  avenger  who  was  to  establish  a  great  Jewish 
kingdom  and  make  all  the  nations  of  the  world  subject  to  the 
laws  of  Jehovah’s  chosen  people. 

And  nothing  was  further  removed  from  the  simple  mind  of 
Jesus  than  this  worldly  idea  of  another  Samson,  astride  a  big 
black  horse,  waving  a  sword  and  leading  his  victorious  armies 
against  those  who  did  not  happen  to  share  the  religious  preju¬ 
dices  of  the  Pharisees  or  the  political  convictions  of  the  Sad- 
ducees. 

It  was  a  question  of  four  letters. 

That  which  separated  Jesus  from  the  merciless  Roman, 
the  sophisticated  Greek  and  the  dogmatic  Jew,  was  his  under¬ 
standing  of  the  word  ‘"love.” 

His  heart  was  fllled  with  love  of  his  fellow-men.  Not 
merely  towards  his  own  friends  in  Nazareth,  his  neighbours  in 
Galilee,  but  towards  the  people  of  that  vaster  world  which  lay 
hidden  beyond  the  last  cxirve  of  the  road  to  Damascus. 

He  pitied  them. 

Their  strife  seemed  so  senseless,  their  ambitions  so  futile, 
their  desire  for  gold  and  glory  such  a  waste  of  valuable  time 
and  energy. 

It  was  true  that  many  of  the  Greek  philosophers  had  come 
to  an  identical  conclusion.  They  too  had  discovered  that  true 


THE  CHILDHOOD  OF  JESUS 


359 


happiness  was  a  matter  of  the  soul  and  did  not  depend  upon  a 
pocket  filled  wth  drachmas  or  the  noisy  approval  of  the  crowd 
in  the  stadium. 

But  they  had  never  carried  their  ideas  beyond  that  small 
and  exclusive  circle  of  well-born  gentlemen  who  alone  in  those 
days  were  allowed  the  luxury  of  an  immortal  soul. 

They  had  resigned  themselves  to  the  existence  of  slaves 
and  of  the  poor  people  and  of  those  millions  for  ever  doomed  to 
dwell  in  misery,  as  being  part  of  an  established  and  inevitable 
order  of  things — as  something  unfortunate  which  just  could 
not  he  helped. 

They  would  as  soon  have  explained  the  principles  of  their 
Epicurean  or  Stoic  philosophy  to  the  dogs  of  the  fields  and 
to  the  cats  of  their  backyards  as  to  the  labourers  who  worked 
in  their  farms  and  to  the  cook  who  prepared  their  dinner. 

In  some  ways  they  were  far  in  advance  of  those  early  Jew¬ 
ish  leaders  who  had  steadfastly  refused  to  acknowledge  the 
rights  of  any  man  who  did  not  belong  to  their  own  tribe. 

But  to  Jesus  (who  knew  nothing  about  them)  they  had  not 
gone  far  enough. 

He  included  all  that  lived  and  breathed  within  the  com¬ 
passion  of  his  great  heart.  And  although  he  had  vague  fore¬ 
bodings  of  the  fate  which  awaited  him  if  he  were  to  teach 
his  doctrine  of  patience  and  kindness  and  humility  to  a  country 
dominated  by  the  uncompromising  Pharisees,  he  could  not 
well  refuse  to  follow  the  voice  which  bade  him  give  his  life  for 
the  cause  of  a  better  world. 

It  was  the  crisis  of  his  career. 

He  could  do  one  of  three  things. 

In  the  first  place,  there  was  the  prospect  of  a  quiet  old 
age  in  Nazareth,  doing  odd  jobs  about  the  town  and  discussing 
profound  questions  of  law  and  ceremony  with  the  rustics  who 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


360 


in  the  evening  gathered  around  the  watering  trough  and  lis¬ 
tened  to  the  village  rabbi. 

This  did  not  appeal  to  Jesus.  It  would  mean  slow  spiritual 
starvation. 

If,  on  the  other  hand,  he  cared  to  lead  a  life  of  adventure, 
he  now  had  his  opportunity. 

He  could  make  use  of  the  enthusiasm  which  his  mere  ap¬ 
pearance  had  created  among  the  followers  of  the  Baptist.  If 

he  would  allow  these  simple  peo¬ 
ple  to  believe  what  they  were 
only  too  eager  to  believe,  he 
could  easily  get  himself  recog¬ 
nised  as  the  long-expected  Mes¬ 
siah  and  could  become  the  head 
of  a  nationalistic  movement 
which,  after  the  example  of  the 
Maccabees,  might  (and  then 
again,  might  not)  bring  inde¬ 
pendence  and  unity  to  the  sorely 
divided  Jewish  nation. 

But  the  temptation  to  do  this  (and  who  during  his  life¬ 
time  does  not  have  a  momentary  dream  of  such  a  future?)  was 
immediately  discarded  as  utterly  unworthy  of  the  ambition 
of  a  serious  man. 

There  remained  therefore  but  one  other  course. 

He  must  go  forth,  must  leave  father  and  mother,  run  the 
risk  of  exile,  hatred  and  death,  to  tell  all  those  who  cared  to 
listen  of  the  things  which  were  uppermost  in  his  own  mind. 

He  was  thirty  years  old  when  he  started  upon  his  great 
work. 

In  less  than  three  years,  his  enemies  had  killed  him. 


JESUS  LEAVES  HOME 


THE  DISCIPLES 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

FROM  VILLAGE  TO  VILLAGE  HE  WANDERED.  HE  TALKED 
TO  ALL  SORTS  AND  CONDITIONS  OF  PEOPLE.  MEN, 
WOMEN  AND  CHILDREN  CAME  TO  LISTEN  EAGERLY 
TO  THE  NEW  WORDS  OF  GOOD-WILL  AND  CHARITY 
AND  LOVE.  THEY  CALLED  JESUS  THEIR  MASTER 
AND  FOLLOWED  HIM  WHEREVER  HE  WENT  AS  HIS 
FAITHFUL  DISCIPLES 

N  the  days  of  Jesus  it  was  compara¬ 
tively  easy  for  an  intelligent  man  with 
a  new  idea  to  get  a  hearing. 

He  did  not  need  a  lecture  room  and 
he  was  not  obliged  to  spend  his  valuable 
time  waiting  until  some  one  had  made 
him  a  professor  or  had  ordained  him  as 
a  minister. 

The  problem  of  board  and  lodging  was  as  easily  settled  in 
Judsea  as  it  was  almost  anywhere  in  Egypt  or  in  western  Asia. 

The  climate  was  mild.  One  suit  of  clothes  would  last  al¬ 
most  a  lifetime.  Food  was  plentiful  in  a  land  where  most 
people  ate  only  just  as  much  as  was  necessary  to  exist  and 
where  they  could  pluck  their  daily  bread  from  the  trees. 


362 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


In  the  time  of  the  J udges  and  the  Kings,  when  the  priestly 
class  had  ruled  supreme,  wandering  orators  who  preached 
strange  heresies  were  not  tolerated.  But  now  the  Roman  po¬ 
liceman  stood  guard  on  the  highroads  and  watched  the  traflSc 
in  the  busy  cities. 

The  Romans,  indifferent  in  matters  of  a  spiritual  nature, 
allowed  all  men  to  seek  salvation  after  their  own  fashion,  pro¬ 
vided  they  kept  away  from  subjects  too  closely  connected  with 
politics.  As  long  as  one  did  not  advocate  open  rebellion  or 
sedition,  there  was  practically  no  limit  to  the  freedom  of  speech. 
The  Roman  magistrate  existed  to  see  that  this  rule  was  en¬ 
forced  and  woe  to  the  Pharisee  who  would  have  dared  to  disturb 
such  a  meeting. 

No  wonder  that  the  new  prophet  was  soon  followed  by  a 
large  number  of  curious  villagers  and  ere  he  had  been  gone  a 
month,  he  had  gained  a  reputation  as  a  speaker  and  a  prophet 
which  reached  far  beyond  the  narrow  confines  of  Galilee. 

It  was  then  the  turn  of  John  to  be  curious.  He  was  still 
at  liberty  although  he  was  closely  watched  by  members  of  the 
National  Council.  He  left  his  beloved  Judeea  and  travelled 
northward  to  meet  J esus. 

It  was  the  last  interview  between  the  two  men. 

It  seems  extremely  doubtful  whether  John  ever  understood 
what  was  in  the  mind  of  his  cousin.  The  two  prophets  looked 
upon  this  world  from  entirely  different  angles.  John  urged 
the  people  to  repent  of  their  sins  in  fear  of  a  wrathful  and 
avenging  Jehovah. 

In  this  he  was  only  following  what  he  had  learned  from  the 
Old  Testament,  which  had  been  hacked  out  of  the  granite  rock 
of  Mount  Sinai. 

Jesus,  on  the  other  hand  (not  yet  with  any  great  decisive¬ 
ness),  conceived  of  life  in  terms  which  like  the  flowers  of  his 


THE  DISCIPLES 


363 


native  land  had  been  smiled  upon  by  the  pleasant  sun  of  a 
warm  climate. 

John  the  Baptist  preached  “Nay!” 

Jesus,  just  as  eagerly,  answered  “Yea!” 

John  shared  the  belief  of  his  fellow  Jews,  who  had  created 
the  coming  Messiah  after  the 
image  of  their  relentless  Je¬ 
hovah. 

Jesus  had  a  vision  of  some¬ 
thing  nobler  and  endowed  the 
common  Father  of  all  things 
with  everlasting  forbearance  and 
a  love  that  surpassed  human  un¬ 
derstanding. 

Between  those  two  views,  no 
compromise  was  possible. 

For  a  moment,  John  seems 
to  have  had  a  glimpse  of  what  Jesus  might  come  to  mean.  He 
told  his  disciples  that  they  must  not  expect  too  much  of  him, 
that  he  was  only  the  forerunner  of  another  teacher,  greater 
than  himself.  And  when  two  of  those  pupils  (acting  upon 
this  suggestion)  left  him  to  follow  Jesus,  he  was  not  angry. 

He  had  given  the  best  there  was  in  him. 

Somehow  or  other,  he  felt  that  he  had  failed. 

His  death,  however  terrible,  came  to  him  as  a  welcome 
relief. 

As  for  Jesus,  almost  immediately  after  the  encounter  with 
John,  he  went  back  to  Galilee  for  a  short  visit  to  Nazareth. 

Joseph  no  longer  lived,  but  Mary  cleverly  kept  her  small 
household  together  and  the  children  could  always  return  to  the 
old  home  whenever  they  needed  a  vacation. 

It  is  not  easy  to  be  the  mother  of  genius.  Mary  never  quite 


364 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

understood  this  strange  son  who  came  and  went  and  who  wan¬ 
dered  all  over  the  land  and  whose  name  was  mentioned  with 
the  awe  of  admiration  or  the  hatred  of  vengeance  whenever 
three  J ews  met  together  by  the  roadside. 

But  she  was  by  far  too  wise  to  stand  in  the  way  of  one  who 
seemed  to  know  so  well  what  he  was  doing. 

And  if  she  sometimes  failed  to  appreciate  the  Prophet,  she 
never  ceased  to  love  her  son. 

This  time,  when  her  boy  came  back  from  his  first  trip  into 

foreign  lands,  she  had  good  news 
for  him. 

There  was  to  be  a  wedding 
in  the  family  and  they  had  all 
been  invited. 

Jesus  said  that  he  would  be 
glad  to  go,  but  he  was  no  longer 
alone.  There  were  his  new 
friends  who  had  followed  him  to 
Nazareth.  He  made  it  plain 
that  he  regarded  them  as  his 
brothers  and  as  such  he  took 
them  along  when  he  went  to  Cana. 

This  was  the  beginning  of  that  close  and  intimate  friend¬ 
ship  which  lasted  until  the  day  of  the  crucifixion. 

Several  hundred  years  later,  when  a  touch  of  the  miraculous 
was  added  to  every  event  in  the  life  of  Jesus  for  the  benefit 
of  the  simple-minded  barbarians  who  had  to  be  gained  for  his 
straightforward  message  of  a  loving  God,  the  story  of  a  pleas¬ 
ant  family  gathering,  where  everybody  had  been  happy  and 
where  Mary  for  the  last  time  had  enjoyed  the  sight  of  her  son 
in  the  midst  of  his  friends  and  relatives,  was  not  considered 
sufficiently  convincing.  It  had  been  adorned  with  a  mysterious 


THE  DISCIPLES 


365 


tale  which  the  painters  of  the  Middle  Ages  used  repeatedly  as 
a  popular  subject  for  their  pictures. 

According  to  this  new  account,  the  sudden  arrival  of  so 
many  extra  guests  had  caused  a  shortage  of  wine. 

The  waiters  had  been  in  great  distress.  There  was  nothing 
but  water,  and  no  J ew  or  Greek  or  Roman  would  have  dreamed 
of  offering  water  to  the  strangers  within  his  gate. 

The  servants  had  rushed  to 
Mary,  who  was  a  careful  house¬ 
wife  and  who  might  perhaps 
know  what  to  do. 

Mary  in  turn  had  spoken  to 
her  son  and  asked  for  his  advice. 

Jesus,  lost  in  deep  thought, 
had  been  somewhat  irritated  by 
this  interruption  on  account  of  a 
matter  of  mere  food  and  drink. 

But  he  was  a  very  human  person 
and  appreciated  the  importance 
of  details.  He  had  understood  the  embarrassment  of  his  host 
whose  careful  arrangements  had  been  upset  by  tbe  unexpected 
appearance  of  half  a  dozen  uninvited  guests. 

To  save  his  relatives  from  their  predicament,  he  had  quietly 
changed  the  water  into  wine  and  the  dinner  had  been  finished 
to  the  satisfaction  of  all. 

As  the  ages  went  by,  similar  bits  of  magic  were  continually 
added  to  the  original  stories.  That  was  quite  natural. 

People  have  always  loved  to  connect  superhuman  power 
with  those  whose  memory  they  worship. 

The  Greek  gods  and  heroes  had  all  performed  a  score  of 
miracles.  The  old  Jewish  Prophets  had  made  iron  float  upon 
the  waters  and  had  walked  across  deep  rivers  and  occasionally 


THE  WEDDING  AT  CANA 


366 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


had  even  been  able  to  interfere  with  the  regular  order  of  the 
planetary  system. 

In  China,  in  Persia,  in  India,  and  in  Egypt,  wherever  we 
turn,  we  meet  with  strange  records  of  supernatural  feats 
which  have  been  common  among  the  earliest  inhabitants  of  those 
far-away  lands. 

This  proves  that  the  need  for  an  imaginary  world  wherein 
the  impossible  becomes  the  self-evident  is  very  general  and  not 
restricted  to  a  particular  country  or  race. 

But  to  many  of  us,  the  influence  which  Jesus  exercised  upon 
the  world  was  so  astonishingly  profound  and  inexplicable  that 
we  are  willing  to  accept  him  without  the  doubtful  embellish¬ 
ments  of  conjuration  and  exorcism. 

In  this  we  may  be  entirely  wrong. 

But  as  the  reader  can  find  full  descriptions  of  all  the  mir¬ 
acles  in  a  thousand  other  books,  we  shall  content  ourselves  with 
a  sober  relation  of  those  events  which  occurred  when  Jesus 
left  his  family  for  the  last  time  and  began  to  teach  that  gospel 
of  mutual  forbearance  and  love  which  led  to  his  death  on  the 


cross. 


THE  NEW  TEACHER 


CHAPTER  XXIV 


SOON  IT  BECAME  KNOWN  ALL  OVER  THE  LAND  THAT 
HERE  WAS  A  PROPHET  WHO  TAUGHT  THE  STRANGE 
DOCTRINE  THAT  ALL  THE  PEOPLE  OF  THIS  EARTH 
(AND  NOT  ONLY  THE  JEWS)  WERE  THE  CHILDREN 
OF  ONE  LOVING  GOD,  AND  THEREFORE  BROTHERS 
AND  SISTERS  TO  EACH  OTHER  AND  TO  ALL  MANKIND 


ROM  Cana,  Jesus,  accompanied  by  his 
friends,  walked  to  Capernaum,  a  little 
village  built  only  a  short  while  before 
on  the  northern  shore  of  the  Sea  of 
Galilee. 

There  lived  the  families  of  Peter 
and  Andrew,  two  fishermen  who  had 
left  their  work  that  they  might  follow 
Jesus  when  he  began  his  great  voyage  of  discovery  for  the  soul 
of  God  and  the  soul  of  Man. 

They  remained  in  Capernaum  for  a  few  weeks  and  then 
decided  to  go  to  Jerusalem. 

This  was  done  for  two  reasons. 

In  the  first  place,  the  feast  of  Passover  was  near  at  hand, 

36T 


368 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


when  it  was  the  duty  of  all  good  Jews  to  pass  the  holy  season 
near  the  Temple. 

And  in  the  second  place,  it  would  give  Jesus  a  chance  to 
find  out  what  the  people  of  the  capital  thought  of  him. 

The  Galileans,  although  openly  despised  by  the  true  Jeru- 


CAPERNAUM 


salemites  (because  they  were  not  supposed  to  be  as  careful  in 
their  devotions  as  those  who  worshipped  in  the  Temple — a  sur¬ 
vival  of  the  ancient  rivalry  between  Judah  and  Israel),  were 
really  a  kindly  people,  willing  to  listen  to  new  ideas. 


THE  NEW  TEACHER 


369 


Perhaps  they  were  not  always  over-enthusiastic,  but  they 
could  be  counted  upon  to  be  polite.  Jerusalem,  on  the  other 
hand,  dominated  by  the  Pharisees,  was  the  mighty  fortress  of 
the  old  faith,  where  intolerance  had  been  elevated  to  a  national 
virtue,  and  where  no  mercy  was  shown  to  the  dissenter. 

Jesus  safely  reached  the  town,  but  before  he  had  an  oppor¬ 
tunity  to  explain  his  ideas,  something  happened  which  obliged 
him  to  leave  in  greater  haste  than 
he  had  come. 

In  the  beginning  of  time, 
people  had  slaughtered  their 
captive  fellow-men  whenever 
they  wished  to  gain  the  favour 
of  their  gods. 

Later  on,  with  the  coming  of 
a  primitive  form  of  civilisation, 
oxen  and  sheep  had  been  substi¬ 
tuted  for  human  beings. 

When  Jesus  was  born,  the 
Jews  still  sacrificed  animals  to 
Jehovah. 

Rich  people  killed  a  cow  and  burned  the  meat  and  fat 
upon  the  altar  in  the  Temple,  with  the  exception  of  the  edible 
parts  which  went  to  the  kitchens  of  the  priests. 

Poor  people,  who  could  not  afford  to  spend  so  much  money, 
bought  a  lamb,  or  if  they  were  very,  very  poor,  a  couple  of 
pigeons,  and  cut  their  throats  in  the  strange  belief  that  such 
an  act  of  useless  slaughter  would  be  pleasant  to  that  selfsame 
God  who  with  such  infinite  care  had  created  the  pretty  beasts 
only  a  short  time  before. 

Now  that  most  of  the  Jews  lived  abroad  (for  they  had  never 
been  willing  to  give  up  the  comforts  of  Alexandria  and  Damas- 


ANDREW  AND  PETER 


370  THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

cus  for  the  crooked  and  dark  streets  of  Jerusalem,  and  more 
than  half  a  million  of  them  were  to  be  found  in  Egypt  alone) 
it  became  necessary  to  keep  a  large  supply  of  live  stock  on  hand 
for  the  benefit  of  those  who  came  from  afar  and  could  not 
drive  their  own  beasts  before  them  all  the  way  from  the  Nile 
to  the  brook  of  Kedron. 

Years  ago,  when  the  Temple  was  built,  the  doomed  oxen 

and  sheep  had  been  offered  for 
sale  in  the  street,  just  outside 
the  entrance  gate  of  the  Temple. 
Later,  for  greater  convenience  of 
the  customers,  the  cattle-dealers 
had  taken  their  herds  inside  the 
Temple  courts.  They  had  been 
followed  by  the  money-changers, 
who,  seated  behind  their  wooden 
banks,  offered  to  change  Baby¬ 
lonian  gold  into  Jewish  shekels 
and  Corinthian  silver  into  Ju¬ 
daean  minas. 

These  good  tradesmen  meant 
no  disrespect.  They  hardly  realised  what  they  were  doing. 
It  was  just  a  very  bad  custom  which  had  developed  so  gradually 
that  no  one  had  noticed  it. 

To  Jesus,  fresh  from  the  quiet  valleys  of  Galilee,  his  mind 
upon  problems  far  removed  from  trade  and  barter,  the  presence 
of  the  bellowing  oxen  and  the  barking  money-changers  seemed 
a  blasphemy  and  an  outrage.  God’s  house  had  become  a  noisy 
market-place — surely  such  a  thing  was  unpardonable! 

He  took  a  whip  (there  were  any  number  of  them  lying 
around)  and  he  drove  that  whole  mob  out  of  the  Temple  and 


THE  MONEY-CHANGER 


THE  NEW  TEACHER 


371 


he  sent  the  poor  beasts  scurrying  after  their  masters  and  the 
house  of  Jehovah  stood  cleansed  of  its  shame. 

The  mob,  eagerly  hoping  for  something  to  happen,  came 


JESUS  DRIVES  AWAY  THE  MONEY-CHANGERS 


rushing  to  this  scene  of  violence  as  fast  as  the  uneven  cobble¬ 
stones  would  let  them. 

There  were  many  who  thought  that  Jesus  was  right.  It 
was  scandalous  that  the  Temple  should  be  used  as  a  cow-shed. 

Others,  however,  were  very  angry.  No  doubt  it  was  per¬ 
haps  not  entirely  desirable  that  there  should  be  quite  so  much 


372 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


noise  so  near  the  Holy  of  Holies,  but  then  again,  it  was  hardly 
the  part  for  an  unknown  young  man  from  the  provinces — Gali¬ 
lee,  was  it?  or  Nazareth,  or  some  such  place — to  create  a  dis¬ 
turbance  and  upset  all  the  tables,  covered  with  money,  and 
make  the  poor  bankers  go  down  upon  all  fours  to  find  their 
lost  pennies. 

Still  others  did  not  know  what  to  make  of  it.  Among  these 

was  a  member  of  the  Supreme 
Council,  a  staunch  old  Pharisee 
by  the  name  of  Nicodemus. 

He  could  not  well  afford  to 
be  seen  in  public  with  one  who 
had  just  behaved  with  such  un¬ 
seemly  lack  of  dignity  in  a  very 
holy  place,  but  he  wanted  to 
know  what  sort  of  man  it  was 
who  had  dared  to  do  such  a  rash 
thing. 

He  sent  for  Jesus  and  bade 
him  come  to  his  house  as  soon  as 
it  should  be  dark. 

Jesus  accepted  the  invitation  and  he  and  Nicodemus  had 
their  talk.  The  Pharisee  was  convinced  that  Jesus  had  been 
entirely  sincere  if  somewhat  over-eager  in  his  efforts.  What 
he  heard  of  his  activities  in  Galilee  strengthened  him  in  his 
conviction,  and  in  his  liking  for  the  young  Nazarene  he  advised 
him  to  leave  the  city  as  soon  as  possible. 

The  palace  of  the  King  had  sensitive  ears  for  anything 
that  sounded  like  a  breach  of  the  common  peace  and  the  cattle- 
dealers  and  money-changers  would  undoubtedly  set  the  people 
against  so  energetic  a  prophet,  who  preferred  action  to  mere 
talk. 


NICODEMUS 


THE  NEW  TEACHER 


373 


And  so  Jesus  left  and  together  with  his  friends  he  travelled 
back  to  Galilee  by  way  of  the  land  of  Samaria. 

That  poor  country,  as  we  have  told  you  before,  enjoyed 
(or  rather  failed  to  enjoy)  a  very  unfortunate  and  quite  unde¬ 
served  reputation  as  a  hotbed  of  godlessness. 

Centuries  before  it  had  been  a  part  of  the  old  kingdom  of 
Israel.  After  the  fall  of  that 
country,  the  inhabitants  had  been 
driven  away  to  Assyria  and  their 
deserted  farms  had  been  handed 
over  to  settlers  from  Mesopo¬ 
tamia  and  from  Asia  Minor. 

Together  with  the  few  remain¬ 
ing  Jews,  these  immigrants  had 
formed  a  new  race  which  was 
known  as  the  Samaritans. 

In  the  eyes  of  the  true  Jews, 
a  man  who  dwelled  within  this 
land  was  something  too  des¬ 
picable  for  words.  Those  ter¬ 
rible  expressions  which  we  so 
unthinkingly  and  insultingly  bestow  upon  the  strangers  within 
our  gate — “wop”  and  “kike”  and  “hunky” — are  no  more 
offensive  than  “Samaritan”  when  used  by  a  hardened  Pharisee 
to  describe  a  citizen  from  Shechem  or  Shiloh. 

As  a  result,  whenever  a  Jew  was  obliged  to  travel  to  Damas¬ 
cus  or  to  Caesarea  Philippi,  he  passed  through  Samaria  as  fast 
as  his  donkey  could  carry  him  and  associated  no  more  with 
the  natives  than  was  absolutely  necessary. 

The  friends  of  Jesus,  good  conservative  followers  of  the 
strict  Mosaic  laws,  fully  shared  the  common  prejudice  against 
the  “dirty  Samaritans.” 


THE  PHARISEE  AND  THE 
SAMARITAN 


374 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


They  had  to  learn  their  lesson. 

ISTot  only  did  Jesus  tarry  by  the  way,  but  he  actually  spoke 

in  a  very  friendly  fashion  to  several  Samaritans,  and  once  he 

even  sat  down  by  the  side  of  a  well  to  explain  his  ideas  to  a 

woman  who  belonged  to  the  despised  race. 

But  when  the  disciples  came 

near  and  listened  to  the  con¬ 
versation,  they  discovered  that 
the  words  of  their  teacher  were 
better  understood  by  this  “Sa¬ 
maritan”  than  they  had  been  by 
those  excellent  Judeans  who 
prided  themselves  so  arrogantly 
upon  their  piety  and  their  zeal 
for  the  law. 

This  was  the  first  time  that 
they  were  taught  the  principle 
of  a  common  brotherhood.  It  was  also  the  beginning  of  Jesus’ 
career  as  the  prophet  of  a  new  faith. 

The  methods  which  he  used  were  quite  unusual. 

Sometimes  he  told  his  disciples  stories. 

But  he  rarely  preached  to  them.  A  word  and  a  hint  were 
enough  to  give  meaning  to  his  hidden  thoughts. 

For  in  this,  as  in  all  other  matters,  Jesus  was  a  born  teacher. 
And  because  he  was  a  great  teacher,  he  understood  the  heart  of 
man  and  he  was  able  to  help  many  who  lacked  the  strength  to 
help  themselves. 

Ever  since  the  beginning  of  time  there  have  been  people 
who  were  able  to  exercise  great  influence  upon  those  who  are 
stricken  with  certain  forms  of  illness.  They  could  not  heal 
broken  bones  and  they  were  not  able  to  stop  an  epidemic  by  a 
nod  of  the  head.  But  as  all  the  world  now  knows,  imagination 


CiESAREA 


THE  NEW  TEACHER 


375 


has  a  great  deal  to  do  with  sickness.  If  we  think  that  we  have 
a  pain,  we  actually  feel  that  pain.  If  some  one  can  only  con¬ 
vince  us  that  we  were  wrong  in  our  amateur  diagnosis,  the 
pain  will  disappear  immediately. 

This  gift  has  often  been  bestowed  upon  simple  and  kindly 
people  who  can  gain  the  confidence  of  their  patients  and  who 
can  cure  them  although  they  are 
utterly  ignorant  of  the  princi¬ 
ples  of  medicine. 

Jesus,  who  inspired  confi¬ 
dence  and  faith  by  the  absolute 
honesty  of  his  person  and  the 
lovable  simplicity  of  his  charac¬ 
ter,  was  undoubtedly  able  to  help 
those  who  came  to  him  in  the 
agony  of  imagined  distress. 

When  it  became  known  that 
the  young  Nazarene  (prophet, 

Messiah,  or  whatever  else  the 
people  in  their  blind  devotion  believed  him  to  be)  could  give 
people  a  temporary  relief  from  their  ailments,  men  and  women 
and  children  came  from  far  and  near  to  ask  that  they  be  restored 
to  health. 

Tradition,  in  its  eagerness  to  make  a  good  story  better, 
insisted  upon  depicting  the  second  journey  through  Galilee  as 
the  triumphant  progress  of  a  wonder-doctor. 

First,  on  the  way  back  to  Capernaum,  it  was  the  child  of  a 
rich  man  which  had  been  given  up  by  the  local  physician  and 
which  was  brought  back  to  life. 

Next  it  was  the  mother-in-law  of  Peter  who  was  ailing  with 
a  severe  fever  and  who,  in  the  twinkling  of  an  eye,  was  suf- 


376 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


ficiently  recovered  to  cook  a  meal  for  her  guests  and  serve  it  to 
them  at  her  own  hospitable  table. 

Then  there  followed  a  steady  stream  of  patients;  people 
who  thought  that  they  were  lame  and  had  to  be  carried  to 


THE  LAME,  THE  HALT  AND  THE  BLIND 

Jesus  on  stretchers;  people  who  for  years  had  suffered  from 
strange  and  indescribable  maladies;  nervous  patients  of  every 
form  and  description  who  needed  but  one  reassuring  word  to 
be  set  upon  the  road  to  recovery. 

Whatever  the  truth  of  several  of  those  stories  (dead  people 
rarely  come  back  to  life)  they  certainly  created  great  excite¬ 
ment  and  curiosity  in  Galilee  and  were  soon  repeated  in  Jeru¬ 
salem. 

But  the  Pharisees  could  not  entirely  approve.  They  were 
Undoubtedly  grateful  for  what  Jesus  had  done  for  their  suf- 


THE  NEW  TEACHER 


377 


fering  fellow-men,  but  they  thought  that  he  had  gone  much 
too  far  when  he  refused  to  make  a  difference  between  members 
of  his  own  race  and  foreigners  and  had  cured  the  servant  of  a 
Roman  officer  and  the  daughter  of  a  Greek  mother,  and  had 
relieved  the  pain  of  an  old  woman  who  insisted  upon  being  sick 
on  the  Sabbath  day,  and  when  he  had  allowed  lepers  to  touch 
the  hem  of  his  garment,  in  their  desperate  hope  that  this  would 
ease  their  misery. 

Besides,  his  willingness  to  accept  a  tax-gatherer,  employed 
by  the  Romans  and  stationed  at  Capernaum,  as  one  of  his 
pupils,  was  a  terrible  thing.  It  seemed  little  short  of  treason 
to  the  cause  of  the  much-suffering  fatherland  and  several  good 
people  told  Jesus  so. 

But  although  he  appreciated  their  motive,  he  was  not  con¬ 
vinced  that  he  had  done  any  wrong. 

To  him,  all  men  and  all  women,  tax-gatherers,  politicians, 
saints  and  sinners,  were  alike. 

He  recognised  and  accepted  their  common  humanity. 

And  that  there  might  be  no  doubt  about  his  stand  upon 
this  matter,  he  took  all  his  disciples  and  together  with  them  he 
went  to  dine  at  the  house  of  one  of  the  offending  officials  as 
if  it  were  an  honour  to  sit  at  the  humble  table  of  a  Roman 
henchman. 

When  the  Pharisees  heard  of  this  they  did  not  say  any¬ 
thing  openly. 

But  they  told  each  other  what  they  would  do  when  Jesus 
again  should  venture  to  come  within  their  jurisdiction.  And 
when  Jesus  came  back  to  Jerusalem  for  the  last  Passover  of 
his  life,  he  was  met  by  the  silent  enmity  of  a  determined  group 
of  men  who  understood  that  their  little  world  would  come  to 
an  end  just  as  soon  as  the  ideals  of  this  strange  prophet  should 
have  been  turned  into  realised  facts. 


THE  OLD  ENEMIES 


CHAPTER  XXV 

OF  COURSE  THOSE  WHO  PROFITED  FROM  THE  EXISTING 
ORDER  OF  THINGS  (AND  THERE  WERE  MANY)  DID 
NOT  LIKE  TO  HEAR  SUCH  DOCTRINES  PUBLICLY  PRO¬ 
CLAIMED.  THEY  DECLARED  THAT  THE  NEW  PROPH¬ 
ET  WAS  A  DANGEROUS  ENEMY  TO  ALL  ESTABLISHED 
LAW  AND  ORDER.  SOON  THESE  ENEMIES  OF  JESUS 
MADE  COMMON  CAUSE.  THEY  SET  TO  WORK  TO  BRING 
ABOUT  HIS  DESTRUCTION 

PON  his  next  visit,  before  he  had  even 
reached  the  Temple,  Jesus  was  in  open 
conflict  with  the  powers  that  ruled 
Jerusalem. 

It  happened  that  when  he  came  near 
the  pool  of  Bethsaida,  just  outside  of 
the  Sheep  Gate,  he  heard  a  man  crying 
out  to  him  for  help.  The  poor  fellow 
had  been  lame  for  more  than  thirty  years.  He  had  been  told 
(like  every  one  else)  of  the  miraculous  cures  in  Galilee.  He 
too  hoped  that  he  could  be  cured. 

Jesus  looked  at  him.  Then  he  told  him  that  there  was 

378 


THE  OLD  ENEMIES 


379 


nothing  the  matter  with  his  legs  and  ordered  him  to  pick  up  his 
mattress  and  go  home. 

The  delighted  patient  did  as  he  had  been  told  but  he  forgot 
that  it  was  the  Sabbath  day  and  that  it  was  against  the  law  of 
the  Pharisees  to  carry  so  much  as  an  extra  pin  in  one’s  clothes. 

In  his  joy  at 
being  able  to  walk, 
he  hastened  away 
to  the  Temple  that 
he  might  give 
thanks  to  Jehovah 
for  his  recovery. 

But  of  course 
several  of  the 
Pharisees  were 
told  of  what  had 
just  happened  and 
as  they  could  not 
allow  such  a  breach 
of  the  holy  com¬ 
mands  to  go  un- 
punished  they 
stopped  the  poor  cripple  (who  was  now  possessed  of  two  per¬ 
fectly  good  legs)  and  they  told  him  that  it  was  against  all  law 
and  precedent  to  be  seen  with  a  mattress  on  one’s  back  on  the 
Sabbath  day  and  that  he  ought  to  be  pimished  for  this  breach 
of  decorum. 

But  the  excited  man,  as  was  quite  natural,  had  his  mind 
on  other  things. 

“He  who  cured  me  told  me  to  take  my  mattress  and  go 
home,”  he  answered,  “and  I  am  doing  what  he  told  me.” 

Thereupon,  without  further  ado,  he  went  his  way,  and  the 


THE  POOL  OF  BETHSAIDA 


/ 


380 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Pharisees  were  left  alone  with  their  rage.  One  thing  they 
understood  very  clearly.  Unless  this  sort  of  thing  were 
stopped,  right  then  and  there,  no  one  could  foretell  what 
would  happen  next. 

At  their  instigation,  the  Sanhedrin  was  called  together  to 
decide  what  to  do.  Like  all  magistrates  who  are  not  just  cer¬ 
tain  of  their  posi¬ 
tion,  the  members 
of  the  council  de¬ 
cided  to  investi¬ 
gate.  Jesus  was 
ordered  to  appear 
before  them  and 
give  an  account  of 
himself.  He  came 
willingly  enough 
and  listened  pa¬ 
tiently  to  the  many 
accusations  of  his  enemies.  Then  he  made  it  clear  that  law  or 
no  law,  he  did  not  intend  to  stop  doing  good  just  because  it 
happened  to  be  a  particular  day  of  the  week. 

This  answer  meant  open  defiance  of  the  established  authori¬ 
ties. 

But  the  Great  Coimcil,  well  knowing  in  what  veneration 
this  man  from  Nazareth  was  held  by  many  people,  thought  it 
better  to  let  him  go  this  time  and  wait  for  another  occasion 
when  they  could  accuse  him  of  something  more  definite. 

By  now  they  were  beginning  to  understand  that  it  would 
not  be  quite  so  easy  to  destroy  Jesus  as  they  had  expected. 
Apparently  it  was  impossible  to  rouse  him  to  anger.  He  never 
showed  any  feeling  towards  those  who  hated  him.  He  quietly 
walked  out  of  every  trap,  and  when  he  was  driven  into  a 


THE  SANHEDRIN  MEETS 


THE  OLD  ENEMIES 


381 


corner,  he  told  a  simple  little  story  which  brought  all  those 
who  listened  over  to  his  side. 

The  Sanhedrin  plainly  was  puzzled.  Of  course,  they  could 
lay  the  matter  before  the  King.  But  their  King  (whose  title 
was  very  uncertain)  would  refuse  to  act  without  consulting 
the  procurator.  And  what  was  the  use  of  trying  to  explain 
anything  to  a  Roman? 

Upon  more  than  one  occasion,  Pilate  had  already  shown 
his  total  lack  of  sympathy  for  those  who  came  to  him  with 
their  religious  grievances. 

In  this  instance,  he  would  do  what  he  had  repeatedly  done 
before.  He  would  promise  that  the  matter  would  have  his 
close  attention.  Then  after  many  months,  he  would  come  to 
the  official  conclusion  that  Jesus  had  committed  no  crime 
against  the  Roman  law.  Next  he  would  throw  the  case  out  of 
court  and  everything  would  be  as  it  had  been  before,  except 
that  the  position  of  Jesus  would  have  been  greatly  strength¬ 
ened  by  his  acquittal. 

Herod,  therefore,  offered  the  only  hope  for  redress  and 
vengeance,  if  he  were  approached  in  the  right  way  and  were 
told  to  keep  the  matter  quiet.  It  was  true  that  for  several 
years  the  King  had  been  at  odds  with  the  Council,  but  this 
was  no  time  to  remember  personal  feuds. 

The  Sanhedrin  buried  the  hatchet  (which  they  had  been 
carefully  whetting  to  destroy  Herod)  and  meekly  went  to  the 
royal  palace  and  poured  forth  a  long  list  of  grievances  against 
the  person  of  one  Jesus,  a  self-styled  prophet  who  was  preach¬ 
ing  seditious  doctrines  which  would  upset  the  old  theocratic 
state  (or  what  remained  of  it)  and  who  was  quite  as  dangerous 
a  person  to  the  safety  of  the  nation  as  that  John  whom  some 
people  had  called  the  Baptist,  who  now  fortunately  was  unable 
to  cause  any  more  trouble. 


382 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Herod,  as  suspicious  as  his  father,  listened  with  willing 
ears. 

But  when  the  time  came  to  arrest  Jesus,  he  could  not  be 
found.  For  the  second  time  he  had  left  the  town,  and  followed 
by  an  ever  increasing  number  of  pupils,  he  was  slowly  wending 
his  way  back  to  Galilee  where  he  felt  more  at  home  than  he 
did  in  Judsea. 

From  a  worldly  point  of  view,  his  career  was  already 
reaching  its  climax.  The  belief  that  Jesus  was  really  the 
Messiah  had  taken  hold  of  the  masses.  They  would  have 
marched  against  Jerusalem,  or  for  that  matter,  against  the 
entire  Roman  army,  had  Jesus  been  willing  to  lead  them. 

But  that,  alas  for  them,  was  still  furthest  away  from  his 
dreams. 

He  had  no  personal  ambition. 

He  did  not  work  for  riches  or  crave  the  glory  and  the 
doubtful  pleasure  of  being  acclaimed  a  national  hero. 

He  wanted  the  people  to  look  beyond  the  immediate  desires 
of  this  earth  and  to  seek  the  companionship  of  that  spirit  who 
was  to  unite  them  in  love  and  in  charity  and  pity  for  their 
fellow-men. 

He  had  no  patience  with  those  who  saw  in  him  simply 
another  (if  better)  representative  of  that  old  royal  power 
which  was  now  associated  with  the  name  of  Herod. 

Instead  of  confessing  himself  the  Messiah,  he  stated  re¬ 
peatedly  and  clearly  and  as  publicly  as  possible  that  his  life, 
his  own  happiness  and  comfort  meant  nothing  to  him  hut 
that  his  ideals  about  the  kinship  of  all  men  and  the  love  of  a 

kindly  God  meant  everything. 

Instead  of  harking  back  to  those  commandments  which 
had  been  revealed  to  a  few  people  amidst  the  thunder  of  Mount 
Sinai,  he  told  the  masses  who  listened  to  him  on  the  smiling 


THE  OLD  ENEMIES 


383 


hillsides  of  Galilee  that  the  God  of  whom  he  spoke  was  a  spirit 
of  love  which  knew  neither  race  nor  creed.  Instead  of  giving 
practical  advice  about  saving  money  and  acquiring  wealth,  he 
cautioned  his  friends  against  those  useless  treasures  which  lie 


THE  SERMON  ON  THE  MOUNT 

accumulated  in  the  attic  of  the  miser  (where  they  are  an  easy 
prey  to  cunning  thieves)  and  asked  them  to  make  their  own 
souls  an  imperishable  storage-house  of  good  deeds  and  noble 
thoughts. 

Finally  he  summed  up  his  entire  philosophy  of  life  in  one 


384 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


single  discourse,  the  famous  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  whose  most 
exalted  passage  I  here  repeat : 

“Blessed  are  the  poor  in  spirit:  for  theirs  is  the  kingdom  of 
heaven.  Blessed  are  they  that  mourn:  for  they  shall  be  com¬ 
forted.  Blessed  are  the  meek:  for  they  shall  inherit  the  earth. 
Blessed  are  they  which  do  hunger  and  thirst  after  righteousness : 
for  they  shall  be  filled.  Blessed  are  the  merciful:  for  they  shall 
obtain  mercy.  Blessed  are  the  pure  in  heart :  for  they  shall  see 
God.  Blessed  are  the  peacemakers :  for  they  shall  be  called  the 
children  of  God.  Blessed  are  they  which  are  persecuted  for 
righteousness’  sake:  for  theirs  is  the  kingdom  of  heaven. 
Blessed  are  ye,  when  men  shall  revile  you,  and  persecute  you, 
and  shall  say  all  manner  of  evil  against  you  falsely,  for  my 
sake.  Rejoice,  and  be  exceeding  glad :  for  great  is  your  reward 
in  heaven:  for  so  persecuted  they  the  prophets  which  were 
before  you.  Ye  are  the  salt  of  the  earth:  but  if  the  salt  have 
lost  his  savour,  wherewith  shall  it  be  salted?  It  is  thenceforth 
good  for  nothing  but  to  be  cast  out,  and  to  be  trodden  under 
foot  of  men.  Ye  are  the  light  of  the  world.  A  city  that  is 
set  on  an  hill  cannot  be  hid.  Neither  do  men  light  a  candle, 
and  put  it  under  a  bushel,  but  on  a  candlestick :  and  it  giveth 
light  unto  all  that  are  in  the  house.  Let  your  light  so  shine 
before  men,  that  they  may  see  your  good  works,  and  glorify 
your  Father  which  is  in  heaven.” 

And  as  a  daily  and  practical  guide  on  the  difficult  path  of 
life  he  gave  them  that  short  prayer  which  is  this  very  day 
repeated  by  a  hundred  million  people  when  they  say : 

“Our  Father  who  art  in  heaven,  Hallowed  be  thy  name. 
Thy  kingdom  come.  Thy  will  be  done  on  earth,  as  it  is  in 
heaven.  Give  us  this  day  our  daily  bread.  And  forgive  us  our 
trespasses  as  we  forgive  those  who  trespass  against  us.  And 


THE  OLD  ENEMIES 


385 


lead  us  not  into  temptation,  but  deliver  us  from  evil.  F or  thine 
is  the  kingdom,  and  the  power,  and  the  glory,  for  ever.  Amen.” 

Then,  having  laid  down  the  general  outline  of  a  new  philos¬ 
ophy  both  of  life  and  of  death  entirely  at  variance  with  the  old 
and  narrow  faith  of  the  Pharisees,  he  asked  those  twelve  men 
who  were  now  his  steady  and  faithful  companions  to  follow 
him  that  he  might  show  all  the  world  how  completely  he  had 
broken  with  those  old  Jewish  prejudices  which  had  made  his 
race  the  enemy  of  all  other  men. 

He  left  Galilee  and  visited  the  territory  which  since  time 
immemorial  had  been  known  as  Phoenicia. 

Next  he  once  more  traversed  the  country  of  his  birth,  rowed 
across  the  river  Jordan  and  deliberately  passed  into  the  land 
of  the  Ten  Cities,  which  the  Greeks  (who  formed  a  majority 
of  the  population)  called  the  Dekapolis. 

There  the  cures  of  a  few  demented  people  which  he  per¬ 
formed  among  the  heathen  caused  as  much  grateful  wonder 
as  similar  cures  had  done  in  his  native  land. 

And  it  was  then  and  immediately  afterwards  that  Jesus 
began  to  illustrate  his  teaching  with  those  very  simple  stories 
which  appealed  so  greatly  to  the  imagination  of  the  people  who 
flocked  together  to  hear  him  and  which  have  become  part  of  the 
language  of  every  European  country. 

It  would  be  foolish,  however,  for  me  to  try  to  retell  them 
in  my  own  way. 

I  am  not,  as  I  have  so  often  said  before,  writing  a  new 
version  of  the  Bible. 

I  am  merely  giving  you  the  general  outline  of  a  book  which 
(especially  in  its  early  parts)  is  often  somewhat  too  compli¬ 
cated  for  the  readers  of  our  own  hurrying  days. 

The  gospels,  however,  are  simple  and  direct  and  very  short. 

Even  the  busiest  of  men  can  find  leisure  to  read  them. 


386 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Fortunately  they  have  been  translated  into  English  by  a 
group  of  seholars  who  were  masters  of  the  language.  Several 
attempts  have  been  made  since  the  seventeenth  century  to  re- 
valuate  the  ancient  Greek  ideas  into  modern  words.  All  of 
these  are  rather  disappointing,  and  none  of  them  has  been 
able  to  replace  the  version  made  by  order  of  King  James.  It 
stands  supreme  to-day  as  it  did  three  centuries  ago. 

If  my  little  book  can  give  you  the  desire  to  read  the  original, 
to  study  those  wise  parables,  to  comprehend  the  immense  vision 
of  this  greatest  of  all  teachers,  I  shall  not  have  written  in  vain. 

And  that  is  really  all  I  am  trying  to  do. 


THE  DEATH  OF  JESUS 


CHAPTER  XXVI 

THE  ROMAN  GOVERNOR  BEFORE  WHOM  THE  CASE  OF 
JESUS  WAS  LAID  DID  NOT  CARE  WHAT  HAPPENED 
AS  LONG  AS  AN  OUTWARD  SEMBLANCE  OF  PEACE  AND 
TRANQUILLITY  WAS  MAINTAINED  WITHIN  HIS  PROV¬ 
INCE.  HE  ALLOWED  JESUS  TO  BE  CONDEMNED  TO 
DEATH, 


HE  end  of  course  was  inevitable,  as 
Jesus  knew  very  well  and  as  he  had 
intimated  to  his  disciples  and  his  rela¬ 
tives  more  than  once  when  he  was  still 
in  Galilee  and  among  his  friends. 

Jerusalem  for  many  centuries  had 
been  the  centre  of  a  religious  monopoly 
which  not  only  brought  great  personal 
profits  to  most  of  the  inhabitants  but  depended  for  its  continued 
success  upon  the  strictest  observance  of  the  ancient  laws,  as 
they  had  been  laid  down  in  the  days  of  Moses. 

Ever  since  the  great  exile,  the  vast  majority  of  the  Jewish 
people  had  insisted  upon  living  abroad.  They  were  much 
happier  in  the  cities  of  Egypt  and  Greece  and  of  the  Italian 


388  THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

peninsula  and  of  Spain  and  of  northern  Africa,  where  trade 
was  brisk  and  money  flowed  freely,  than  in  Judaea,  where  the 
barren  and  exhausted  soil  could  only  be  coaxed  into  a  faint 
activity  by  endless  hours  of  toil. 

When  the  Persians  had  allowed  the  Jews  to  return  to  their 
home-land  it  had  been  impossible  to  bring  a  sufficient  number 

of  inhabitants  back  to  the  city 
without  the  use  of  soldiers. 
Since  then,  conditions  had  not 
improved. 

The  Jews,  wherever  found, 
continued  to  regard  Jerusalem 
with  deep  respect  as  the  religious 
centre  of  their  nation,  but  their 
fatherland  was  there  where  they 
happened  to  have  found  a  com¬ 
fortable  home  and  nothing  short 
of  absolute  force  would  bring 
them  back  to  the  land  of  their  birth. 

As  a  result,  those  people  who  dwelt  within  the  gates  of 
the  old  national  capital  were  almost  without  exception  con¬ 
nected  with  the  Temple,  just  as  to-day  the  inhabitants  of  many 
of  our  smaller  college  towns  depend  directly  or  indirectly  upon 
the  University  for  their  daily  bread  and  butter  and  would 
either  starve  or  be  obliged  to  move  if  the  University  were 
obliged  to  close  its  doors. 

The  economic  and  spiritual  aristocracy  of  this  group  con¬ 
sisted  of  a  small  number  of  professional  priests. 

Next  came  their  assistants  who  had  to  look  after  the  com¬ 
plicated  ritual  of  the  burnt  offerings  and  the  minor  sacrifices. 
They  were  really  highly  trained  and  skilful  butchers,  personally 
interested  in  the  number  and  the  quality  of  the  animals  which 


THE  DESERTED  FARM 


JESUS  CROSSES  TO  A  FOREIGN  LAND 


THE  DEATH  OF  JESUS 


389 


were  brought  to  them  and  which  provided  them  with  the 
greater  part  of  their  daily  food. 

Then  there  were  the  common  servants  who  kept  the  Temple 
clean  and  washed  the  courts  in  the  evening  after  the  crowd 
had  dispersed. 

Then  there  were  the  money-changers,  the  bankers  as  we 


THE  MERCHANTS  OF  JERUSALEM 


would  call  them  to-day,  who  trafficked  in  the  strange  metals 
that  were  brought  to  them  from  every  part  of  the  world. 

Then  there  were  the  hotel-keepers  and  the  inn-keepers  and 
^the  boarding-house-keepers,  who  offered  board  and  lodging  to 
the  hundreds  of  thousands  of  pilgrims  who  annually  travelled 
to  Jerusalem  that  they  might  keep  the  law  and  worship  at  the 
appointed  time  at  the  ancestral  altar. 


390 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Then  there  were  all  the  usual  shopkeepers  and  tailors  and 
shoemakers  and  wine  merchants  and  candlestick  makers  who 
are  to  be  found  in  any  city  which  has  become  a  tourist  centre. 

For  that  is  what  Jerusalem  really  was. 

A  religious  tourist  centre  to  which  the  people  flocked,  not 
for  the  purpose  of  amusement,  but  to  perform  certain  rites 

which  ( so  they 
fl  r  m  1  y  believed) 
could  not  possibly 
be  performed  in 
another  place  or  by 
another  set  of 
men  than  those 
who  since  time  im¬ 
memorial  had  ex¬ 
ercised  the  office  of 
Priest. 

You  must  get 
firm  hold  of  these 
facts  if  you  are  to 
understand  the  scorching  looks  of  hatred  which  were  thrown  at 
Jesus  when  he  once  more  dared  to  enter  the  city. 

There  he  came,  this  carpenter,  from  a  forlorn  village  in 
Galilee — this  humble  teacher  whose  great  love  embraced  even 
sinners  and  publicans. 

Twice  before  he  had  been  told  to  leave. 

He  was  not  wanted  in  J erusalem. 

Had  he  returned  to  cause  more  trouble?  or  would  he  con¬ 
tent  himself  with  a  few  speeches? 

It  is  true,  these  little  talks  which  he  sometimes  delivered 
to  his  companions  sounded  very  harmless.  But  they  were  really 
most  dangerous.  The  man  was  for  ever  hinting  at  things.  Not 


THE  DEATH  OF  JESUS 


391 


in  those  vague  terms  which  were  so  popular  with  the  learned 
scribes  who  loved  to  hide  the  meaning  of  everything  they  said 
underneath  a  copious  verbiage  of  Hebrew  sentences  which  cre¬ 
ated  an  impression  of  profound  erudition. 

No,  he  used  words  which  all  the  people  could  understand. 
Jesus  said:  “Thou  shalt  love  the  Lord  thy  God  with  all  thy 
heart,  and  with  all  thy  soul,  and  with  all  thy  mind.  This  is  the 
first  and  great  commandment.  And  the  second  is  like  unto  it : 
Thou  shalt  love  thy  neighbour  as  thyself.” 

And  then,  there  were  those  parables  about  shepherds  and 
all  sorts  of  every-day  things  which  went  straight  to  the  heart 
of  the  matter. 

Some  people  had  tried  to  answer  the  unmistakable  allusions 
to  false  leaders  and  to  unworthy  gods. 

But  Jesus  had  confused  them  with  a  new  array  of  stories 
and  the  crowd  had  laughed  its  approval.  Even  the  children 
had  come  to  listen  and  because  they  had  liked  this  man  they 
had  clambered  upon  his  knees.  Jesus  said:  “Suffer  httle  chil¬ 
dren  to  come  unto  me :  and  forbid  them  not ;  for  of  such  is  the 
kingdom  of  God.” 

In  short,  the  Nazarene  was  for  ever  doing  and  saying  those 
things  which  a  decent  and  self-respecting  rabbi  would  never 
have  done  or  said,  and  he  went  his  way  so  pleasantly  and  so 
quietly  that  the  police  were  powerless  to  interfere. 

And  then  the  doctrines  which  this  man  seemed  to  hold ! 

Had  he  not  stated,  upon  more  than  one  occasion,  that  the 
Kingdom  of  God  was  everywhere  and  stretched  far  and  wide 
beyond  the  borders  of  Judaea  where  dwelt  the  chosen  few  of 
Jehovah’s  predilection? 

Had  he  not  openly  broken  the  Sabbath  under  the  pretext 
of  curing  a  sick  woman? 

Didn’t  they  say  in  Galilee  that  he  had  dined  in  the  homes  of 


392 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


foreigners  and  Roman  officials  and  people  who  would  never  be 
tolerated  within  the  outer  portals  of  the  Temple? 

What  was  to  become  of  J erusalem  and  of  the  Temple  and 
of  the  priests  and  of  the  inn-keepers  and  of  the  butchers  and 
of  everybody  else,  if  the  people  of  the  city  were  to  take  such 
words  seriously  and  actually  began  to  believe  that  the  spirit 

of  God  could  be  worshipped  just 
as  well  in  Damascus  or  Alex¬ 
andria  as  on  Mount  Moriah? 

The  town  would  be  ruined 
and  the  priests  and  the  inn-keep¬ 
ers  and  the  butchers  and  every¬ 
body  else  would  be  ruined  along 
with  it. 

And,  ghastly  to  contemplate, 
the  whole  complicated  fabric  of 
Mosaic  law  would  come  tumbling 
dov/n  before  this  terrible  new 
slogan  of  “Love  your  neighbour.’’ 

For  that,  in  truth,  was  the  gist  of  everything  Jesus  taught 
during  the  last  months  of  his  life. 

He  wanted,  he  implored  people  to  love  their  neighbours 
and  to  stop  quarrelling  among  themselves.  He  was  crushed 
by  the  cruelty  and  the  unreasoning  injustice  of  everything 
he  saw  around  him.  By  nature  he  was  cheerful  and  full  of 
fun.  Life  was  a  joy  to  him  and  not  a  burden.  He  loved  his 
mother,  his  family,  his  friends.  He  took  part  in  all  the  simple 
pleasures  of  his  village.  He  was  not  a  hermit  and  did  not 
encourage  those  who  tried  to  save  their  own  souls  by  running 
away  from  life.  But  the  world  seemed  so  needlessly  full  of 
waste,  of  pain,  of  violence  and  disorder. 

In  the  simplicity  of  his  great  heart,  Jesus  offered  a  cure  of 


JESUS  EATS  WITH  A 
FOREIGNER 


THE  DEATH  OF  JESUS  393 

his  own  for  these  ills.  He  called  it  love.  And  that  one  word 
was  the  sum  total  of  his  teaching. 

He  did  not  greatly  interest  himself  in  the  existing  order 
of  things. 

I 

He  did  not  argue  against  the  Empire. 

He  never  spoke  in  favour  of  it. 

The  Pharisees  slyly  tried  to  catch  him  in  an  expression 
of  sedition  when  they  asked  him  what  he  thought  of  the  Em¬ 
peror.  But  Jesus  knew  that  all  form  of  government  is  merely 
a  compromise  and  he  refused  to  commit  himself.  He  advised 
his  hearers  to  obey  the  law  of  the  land  and  to  think  more  of 
their  own  faults  than  of  the  virtues  or  the  defects  of  their 
rulers. 

He  did  not  tell  his  pupils  to  keep  away  from  the  service 
in  the  Temple,  but  encouraged  them  to  be  faithful  in  the 
performance  of  their  religious  duties. 

He  had  a  sincere  admiration  for  the  wisdom  of  the  Old 
Testament,  and  continually  referred  to  it  in  his  own  conver¬ 
sation. 

In  short,  he  refrained  from  saying  or  preaching  or  advo¬ 
cating  anything  that  could  be  construed  as  an  open  challenge 
of  the  established  laws. 

But  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  Pharisees,  he  was  much 
more  dangerous  than  the  fiercest  of  all  rebels. 

He  made  the  people  think  for  themselves. 

^  ^  ^  ^  ^  ^ 

As  for  the  last  days  of  Jesus,  they  have  so  often  been 
told  that  we  can  be  short  about  them.  No  part  of  the  life  of 
the  great  Prophet  has  received  so  much  attention  from  Chris' 
tian  chroniclers  as  the  few  days  immediately  preceding  his 
death. 


394 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


It  was  really  part  of  the  eternal  struggle  between  those 
who  keep  their  backs  turned  firmly  upon  the  future  and  one 
man  who  courageously  dared  to  look  forward. 

The  last  entrance  of  Jesus  into  Jerusalem  was  in  the  nature 
of  a  triumph. 

This  did  not  mean  that  the  people  really  had  begun  lo 

understand  the  new  ideas  which 
he  so  patiently  tried  to  explain 
to  them.  But  for  ever  in  search 
of  a  hero  whom  they  could  wor¬ 
ship  (for  however  short  a  time) 
they  had  now  begun  to  idolise 
the  INTazarene  prophet  who  had 
appealed  to  their  imagination  by 
his  lovable  personality  and  the 
calm  courage  which  he  displayed 
in  the  presence  of  the  almighty 
Councillors. 

They  were  willing  to  believe  anything  that  was  told  about 
Jesus,  provided  it  had  a  touch  of  the  extraordinary. 

Mere  cures  were  not  enough  to  satisfy  their  primitive  need 
of  excitement. 

The  patient  was  very  sick  when  Jesus  happened  to  come 
to  his  village? 

Nay! 

The  patient  had  been  on  the  verge  of  death! 

Until  at  last  the  poor  patient  had  actually  been  dead  and 
buried  and  had  been  taken  out  of  the  grave  to  be  restored  to 
life  by  the  man  of  miracles. 

This  last  story,  the  famous  case  of  Lazarus,  had  made  an 
enormous  impression  upon  the  credulous  peasants  of  Judasa. 
Repeated  from  farm  to  farm,  it  had  soon  acquired  a  wealth 


THE  FANATIC 


THE  DEATH  OF  JESUS 


395 


of  lurid  detail  which  made  it  a  very  popular  subject  for  mediae¬ 
val  legends  and  pictures. 

When  finally  the  cause  of  all  this  commotion  was  said  to  be 
in  Jerusalem,  every  one  wanted  to  see  him,  and  when  Jesus 
entered  the  city  gate  on  his  little  donkey,  the  crowd  lustily 
shouted  hooray  and  threw  flowers  and  generally  made  a 
great  noise,  as  it  will  do  whenever  it  finds  an  excuse  for  a 
celebration. 

Unfortunately  such  public  approval  is  like  a  bonfire  on  a 
rocky  hill.  It  makes  a  great  blaze,  but  it  does  not  last  very 
long. 

Jesus  knew  this  and  he  did  not  flatter  himself  that  all  these 
hosannas  and  hallelujahs  meant  anything. 

He  had  heard  them  before.  Other  people  have  heard  them 
since. 

And  if  they  have  been  wise,  they  have  not  taken  them 
seriously.  The  wisdom  of  which  remark  the  following  pages 
will  show  clearly. 

The  first  thing  which  Jesus  did  after  his  arrival  was  to  look 
for  lodgings.  He  did  not  stop  in  the  city  itself  but  in  the 
suburb  of  Bethany  which  was  situated  upon  the  Mount  of 
Olives.  There  in  former  years  he  had  often  stayed  with  Laza¬ 
rus  and  his  faithful  sisters,  Mary  and  Martha. 

It  was  only  a  short  walk  to  Jerusalem  and  as  soon  as  he 
had  eaten  something  and  rested  from  the  fatigue  of  the  day 
before,  he  went  back  to  the  Temple  and  for  the  second  time 
took  a  whip  and  drove  the  cattle  dealers  and  the  money¬ 
changers  out  of  the  holy  enclosure. 

The  next  morning,  very  early,  he  had  his  answer. 

The  Sanhedrin  had  taken  up  his  challenge. 

And  when  Jesus  appeared  at  the  door  of  the  Temple,  he 
was  stopped  by  armed  guards  and  was  asked  upon  whose 


396 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


authority  he  had  committed  the  sacrilegious  act  of  the  afternoon 
before. 

At  once  a  mob  was  formed.  People  took  sides. 

Some  said:  “This  man  is  right.” 

Others  shouted:  “He  ought  to  be  lynched.” 

And  they  argued  and  gesticulated  and  would  have  come  to 
blows,  when  Jesus  turned  around  and  looked  at  them.  Then 
they  became  very  quiet  and  Jesus  told  them  a  few  more  stories. 

Nothing  else  could  have  given  such  offence  to  the  Pharisees. 

Again  Jesus  was  taking  the  initiative  and  was  talking  right 
over  the  heads  of  the  priests  to  the  multitude,  and  as  always 
happened  when  he  made  a  personal  appeal,  Jesus  gained  the 
immediate  good  will  of  his  audience. 

He  was  the  victor  in  this  opening  battle  with  the  authori¬ 
ties.  The  soldiers  were  obliged  to  let  him  go,  and  followed  by 
his  friends  he  quietly  walked  back  to  his  lodgings  and  that  day 
he  was  not  molested  any  further. 

But  all  this  meant  very  little. 

When  the  Pharisees  set  out  to  destroy  a  man  they  did  not 
rest  until  their  victim  had  been  killed.  And  Jesus,  who  knew 
this,  was  in  a  very  serious  mood  as  night  approached. 

There  was  something  else  which  gave  him  reason  for 
anxiety. 

Thus  far  his  pupils  had  been  very  faithful  to  him,  and  the 
twelve  who  were  always  with  him  had  really  loved  each  other 
like  so  many  brothers  and  had  borne  with  each  other’s  short¬ 
comings  with  exemplary  kindness. 

But  with  one  of  them,  all  was  not  well. 

Judas  he  was  called  and  he  was  the  son  of  a  man  who  lived 
in  the  village  of  Cariot  or  Kerioth.  He  therefore  was  a 
Judaean,  whereas  the  other  eleven  were  Galileans.  This  may 
have  had  something  to  do  with  his  attitude  towards  Jesus. 


THE  DEATH  OF  JESUS 


397 


He  felt  all  the  time  that  he  was  being  slighted — that  the 
Galileans  were  trying  to  get  the  better  of  him — that  he  was  a 
victim  of  his  national  antecedents. 

None  of  this  was  true,  but  given  a  mean  man  with  a  petty 
mind,  the  most  harmless  remark  may  be  turned  into  an  un¬ 
pardonable  insult. 

And  Judas,  who  seemed  to  have  joined  Jesus  on  the  impulse 
of  a  very  momentary  enthusiasm,  was  a  greedy  scoundrel  with 
all  the  vengeful  hatreds  of  a  person  aware  of  his  own  inferior 
qualities. 

He  had  a  great  gift  for  figures  and  the  other  disciples  had 
therefore  asked  him  to  be  their  treasurer  and  book-keeper  and 
see  that  their  slender  funds  were  equally  divided  among  all 
twelve. 

Even  in  that  quality,  Judas  had  not  given  complete  satis¬ 
faction  and  had  gained  the  distrust  of  his  fellow  disciples. 
He  was  forever  grumbling  at  the  expense  of  some  of  the  pres¬ 
ents  which  were  forced  upon  Jesus.  More  than  once  he  had 
publicly  given  signs  of  his  irritation  when  money  was  squan¬ 
dered  upon  what  he  was  pleased  to  call  ‘‘useless  luxury.” 

Jesus  had  spoken  to  him  about  this  and  had  tried  to  show 
him  how  foolish  and  ill-mannered  it  was  to  show  resentment 
at  a  gift  which  had  been  offered  with  the  kindest  of  intentions. 

But  Judas  could  not  be  convinced. 

He  did  not  say  anything. 

Neither  did  he  leave  Jesus.  He  continued  to  call  himself 
one  of  “the  twelve”  and  listened  with  assumed  eagerness  when¬ 
ever  Jesus  explained  one  of  his  favourite  ideas.  But  in  his 
mind  he  was  working  on  an  idea  of  his  own.  His  vanity  had 
been  hurt  by  the  reprimand,  and  he  decided  to  commit  the 
lowest  of  all  crimes.  He  was  going  to  “get  even.” 


398 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Here  in  J erusalem,  where  he  was  among  his  own  people,  the 
opportunity  for  revenge  would  offer  itself  easily. 

When  all  the  other  disciples  were  asleep,  Judas  escaped 
from  the  house,  and  soon  the  Great  Council,  sitting  late  to 
discuss  the  steps  which  were  to  be  taken,  heard  that  there  was  a 

man  outside  who  offered  to  give 
them  some  very  important  in¬ 
formation. 

They  told  the  guards  to 
bring  him  in  and  they  crowded 
around  him  to  listen  to  his  story. 

Judas  went  straight  to  the 
heart  of  the  problem. 

The  Council  wanted  to  get 
hold  of  the  person  of  Jesus? 
They  most  certainly  did. 

But  they  were  afraid  of 
causing  a  disturbance  in  view 
of  the  Nazarene’s  well-known  popularity  with  the  crowd? 

That  again  was  true. 

And  if  they  arrested  him  in  public,  and  there  was  any 
trouble,  then  the  Roman  soldiers  would  be  called  out  and  that 
would  be  fatal  to  the  prestige  of  the  Pharisees  and  would  be 
used  by  the  Sadducees  for  political  purposes? 

Quite  correct. 

Therefore,  whatever  was  to  be  done  must  be  done  quietly 
and  under  the  guard  of  darkness  and  with  the  least  possible 
noise? 

Judas  had  understood  the  situation  very  well  indeed. 

But  suppose  that  some  one  who  was  thoroughly  familiar 
with  the  movements  of  Jesus  should  offer  to  tell  them  how  he 


THE  REWARD 


THE  DEATH  OF  JESUS 


399 


could  be  captured  so  that  no  one  would  hear  of  it  until  he  was 
safely  in  prison? 

That  would  fit  in  excellently  with  the  plans  of  the  Council. 
How  much  were  they  willing  to  pay  for  this  very  valuable 
information? 

There  was  a  momentary  consultation. 


JUDAS 


A  certain  sum  was  mentioned. 

Judas  was  satisfied. 

The  bargain  was  struck. 

Jesus  had  been  sold  to  his  enemies. 

The  price  was  thirty  pieces  of  silver. 

^  ^  ^  ^  ^  ^ 

Jesus  spent  his  last  few  hours  of  liberty  quietly  in  the  sub¬ 
urb  of  Bethany. 

It  was  the  day  of  Passover.  The  Jews  observed  this  feast 
by  eating  roast  lamb  and  unleavened  bread. 

J esus  asked  his  disciples  to  go  to  town  and  reserve  a  room 


400 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


in  one  of  the  smaller  inns  and  order  a  dinner,  that  they  might 
all  be  together. 

When  evening  came,  Judas,  looking  bland  and  innocent, 
left  the  house  together  with  the  others. 

They  went  down  the  Mount  of  Olives  and  entered  the  city 
and  found  that  everything  was  ready. 

They  took  their  seats  around  one  long  table  and  began  to 

eat. 

But  it  was  not  a  cheerful  meal.  They  felt  the  dread  of  those 
coming  events  which  already  were  casting  their  terrible  shadow 
over  the  small  group  of  faithful  friends. 

Jesus  spoke  very  little. 

The  others  sat  in  gloomy  silence. 

At  last,  Peter  could  stand  it  no  longer  and  he  blurted  out 
what  was  in  everybody’s  mind. 

“Master,”  he  said,  “we  want  to  know.  Do  you  have  reason 
to  suspect  one  of  us?” 

Softly  Jesus  answered:  “Yes.  One  among  you  who  is 
now  sitting  at  this  table  will  bring  disaster  upon  us  all.” 

Then  all  the  disciples  got  up  and  crowded  around  him. 
They  protested  their  innocence. 

At  that  moment  Judas  slipped  quietly  out  of  the  room. 

They  now  all  knew  what  was  to  come. 

They  could  no  longer  stand  it  in  that  little  room. 

They  needed  fresh  air,  and  they  left  the  inn  and  walked 
out  of  the  gate  and  went  back  to  the  Mount  of  Olives  and 
opened  the  wicket  to  a  garden  which  a  friend  had  told  them  to 
use  whenever  they  wished  to  be  alone. 

It  was  called  Gethsemane,  after  an  old  oil-press  which 
stood  in  a  corner. 

It  was  a  warm  night. 

They  were  all  very  tired. 


THE  LAST  SUPPER 


THE  DEATH  OF  JESUS 


401 


After  a  while  Jesus  walked  away  from  the  little  group. 
But  three  of  the  disciples  who  were  closest  to  him,  followed 
at  a  distance. 

He  turned  around  and  bade  them  wait  and  watch  while  he 
prayed. 

The  time  had  come  for  a  final  decision.  Escape  was  still 
possible,  but  escape  would  mean  a  silent  confession  of  guilt 
and  defeat  for  his  ideas. 

He  was  alone  among  the 
silent  trees  and  fought  his  last 
great  battle. 

He  was  a  man  in  the  fulness 
of  his  years. 

Life  still  held  a  great  prom¬ 
ise. 

Death,  once  his  enemies  cap¬ 
tured  him,  would  come  in  a  most 
terrible  form. 

He  made  his  choice. 

He  stayed. 

He  went  back  to  his  friends. 

And  behold!  they  were  fast  asleep. 

A  moment  later,  the  whole  garden  was  in  an  uproar. 

Led  by  Judas,  the  guards  of  the  Sanhedrin  rushed  upon 
the  prophet. 

Judas  was  at  their  head. 

He  threw  his  arms  around  his  master  and  kissed  him. 

That  was  the  sign  for  which  the  soldiers  had  waited. 

At  that  moment,  Peter  realised  what  was  happening. 

He  grabbed  the  sword  from  the  hand  of  one  of  the  assail¬ 
ants  and  fiercely  he  hacked  at  him.  He  hit  him  on  the  side 
of  the  head  and  the  blood  spurted  from  a  ghastly  wound. 


402 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Jesus  put  his  hand  upon  Peter’s  arm. 
There  must  be  no  violence. 

The  soldier  was  only  doing  his  duty. 


GETHSEMANE 


One  blow  would  only  lead  to  another,  and  ideas  were  not 
fought  with  daggers  and  spears. 

Jesus  was  handcuffed  and  through  the  dark  streets  of 
Jerusalem  he  was  taken  to  the  house  of  Annas,  who  together 
with  Caiaphas,  his  son-in-law,  was  acting  as  High  Priest. 
They  shouted  with  joy. 

Their  enemy  was  at  their  mercy. 

The  questioning  began  at  once. 

Why  had  Jesus  been  teaching  those  pernicious  doctrines? 
What  did  he  mean  by  his  attacks  upon  the  old  ceremonies? 
Who  had  given  him  the  right  to  speak  the  way  he  did? 
Jesus  answered  quietly  that  it  was  useless  to  reply.  The 


THE  DEATH  OF  JESUS 


403 


priests  knew  the  answer  to  their  own  questions.  He  had  never 
hidden  anything  from  any  one.  Why  waste  time  upon  further 
talk? 

One  of  the  guards,  who  had  never  heard  a  prisoner  speak  in 


CAIAPHAS  AND  ANNAS 


that  fashion  to  a  member  of  the  Sanhedrin,  hit  Jesus  a  terrible 
blow.  Then  the  others  took  him  and  bound  him  even  tighter 
than  before  and  they  dragged  him  to  the  house  of  Caiaphas, 
where  he  was  to  spend  the  night. 

It  was  too  late  to  call  the  Great  Council  together. 

But  as  soon  as  the  excited  Pharisees  and  the  much-disturbed 


404 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Sadducees  heard  of  the  arrest,  they  left  their  beds,  and  through 
the  dark  rushed  to  the  room  where  Jesus  sat,  peacefully  wait¬ 
ing  for  what  was  to  happen  next. 

Suddenly  there  was  a  rumour  near  the  door.  The  guards 
had  got  hold  of  one  of  the  disciples.  One  of  the  maids,  so  they 
explained,  had  just  told  them  that  this  fisherman  was  a  great 
friend  of  Jesus  and  had  often  been  seen  with  him  when  they 
came  to  town. 

Poor  Peter  was  struck  by  panic. 

The  lights  and  the  noise  and  the  curses  filled  his  heart  with 
terror. 

Tremblingly  he  denied  that  he  had  ever  known  Jesus. 

Angrily  the  disappointed  guards  kicked  him  out  of  the 
room. 

J esus  once  more  was  alone  with  his  enemies. 

In  this  rough  and  tumble  fashion  the  night  was  spent,  but 
the  next  morning,  as  early  as  possible,  the  Great  Council  con¬ 
vened,  and  without  examining  the  evidence  or  listening  to  any 
witnesses,  they  condemned  the  Nazarene  to  death. 

According  to  tradition,  it  was  Friday,  April  the  seventh. 

The  main  purpose  had  been  accomplished.  The  Pharisees 
had  rid  their  city  of  a  great  menace. 

But  their  work  remained  as  yet  only  half  done. 

There  came  insistent  messengers  from  Roman  headquar¬ 
ters. 

Pilate  wished  to  know  what  this  commotion  meant. 

He  was  told. 

'No  doubt  all  this  was  very  interesting,  but  might  he  remind 
the  Jews  that  neither  their  King  nor  their  Council  had  the  right 
to  execute  a  man  without  a  hearing  before  the  Roman  governor 
of  the  district? 

Much  against  their  will,  the  Sanhedrin  let  go  of  their 


JESUS  IS  TAKEN  BEFORE  HEROD 


THE  DEATH  OF  JESUS 


405 


victim  and  Jesus  was  conducted  to  the  royal  palace,  where 
Pilate  was  staying,  to  be  questioned. 

The  pious  Pharisees  remained  outside.  It  was  the  time  of 
Passover,  when  no  Jew  should  touch  anything  belonging  to  the 
heathen. 

Pilate  was  greatly  annoyed.  Ever  since  he  had  been  in 
Judaea,  there  had  been  trouble. 

Some  one  was  for  ever  bother¬ 
ing  him  with  questions  which  he 
did  not  understand  and  which 
seemed  utterly  absurd  and  futile. 

He  gave  orders  that  Jesus 
be  taken  into  his  private  rooms. 

There  he  talked  with  him. 

A  few  minutes’  conversation 
convinced  him  that  here  was  no 
cause  for  a  death-warrant. 

The  charges  were  absurd.  peter  denies  jesus 

Jesus  ought  to  be  set  free. 

Pilate  sent  for  the  spokesman  of  the  Council  and  informed 
him  bluntly  that  he  had  not  been  able  to  find  Jesus  guilty  of 
anything  known  to  Roman  law. 

That  was  a  terrible  blow  to  the  Pharisees. 

It  looked  as  if  their  victim  might  escape. 

They  pleaded  with  the  governor.  They  told  him  that  Jesus 
had  been  stirring  up  trouble  all  the  way  from  Judaea  to  Galilee. 

That  gave  Pilate  an  idea. 

‘Ts  this  man  a  Galilean  or  a  Judsean  subject?”  he  asked. 

“Galilean,”  he  was  told. 

“Then  take  him  before  Herod  Antipas,  who  is  King  of 
Galilee,  and  let  him  decide,”  Pilate  answered,  glad  to  have 
found  an  excuse  for  washing  his  hands  of  this  affair. 


406 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


But  His  Majesty  was  as  little  inclined  to  take  the  responsi¬ 
bility  as  was  the  Homan  official.  He  had  come  to  Jerusalem 
to  celebrate  the  Passover  and  not  to  judge  people  who  were 
to  be  executed.  He  had  heard  a  great  deal  about  Jesus  and  he 
had  always  imagined  him  to  be  some  sort  of  magician. 

He  asked  Jesus  to  show  him 
the  secret  arts  of  sorcery,  and 
Jesus,  of  course,  refused  to  give 
an  answer  to  so  absurd  a  re¬ 
quest.  At  that  point,  the  inter¬ 
view  was  interrupted. 

There  was  no  reason  why  the 
faithful  should  keep  away  from 
one  of  their  own  compatriots, 
and  the  crowd  now  freely  pushed 
into  the  court-room. 

“He  says  that  he  is  a  King,” 
they  shouted.  “He  has  told  us  himself  that  he  is  above  the 
law.”  And  all  the  foolish  accusations  which  by  now  were 
shouted  through  the  streets  of  Jerusalem  were  repeated  with 
renewed  violence. 

Herod  understood  that  he  would  have  a  riot  on  his  hands 
unless  he  acted  quickly.  Better  sacrifice  an  unpopular  subject 
than  run  the  risk  of  losing  a  throne. 

“Take  this  man,”  he  ordered.  “Dress  him  up  like  the  King 
he  pretends  to  be,  and  then  send  him  back  to  Pilate.” 

Somewhere  a  dirty  old  cloak  was  found  and  it  was  thrown 
across  the  shoulders  of  Jesus.  The  guards  took  him  in  their 
midst  and  back  the  whole  mob  went  to  see  Pilate. 

A  man  of  courage  might  have  saved  Jesus.  But  Pilate  was 
merely  well-intentioned.  He  had  talked  the  case  over  with  his 
wife,  who  had  urged  him  to  use  clemency.  But  there  was  only 


THE  DEATH  OF  JESUS 


407 


JESUS  IS  TAKEN  TO  PRISON 


408 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


a  small  garrison  in  Jerusalem,  and  the  members  of  the  Council 
grew  more  and  more  threatening.  For  by  this  time,  the  Sad- 
ducees  had  made  common  cause  with  the  Pharisees.  They  were 


GOLGOTHA 

politicians,  and  their  interest  in  religion  was  only  secondary. 
They  feared  the  practical  consequences  if  Jesus  were  allowed 
to  go  free  and  decided  therefore  that  he  must  die  for  the  good 
of  the  state.  Darkly  they  hinted  to  Pilate  of  certain  secret 
reports  which  were  ready  to  be  sent  to  Cassar,  explaining  in 


THE  DEATH  OF  JESUS 


409 


detail  just  what  had  happened  and  how  his  governor  had  openly 
taken  the  side  of  an  enemy  of  the  Empire. 

That  would  mean  dismissal  without  the  benefit  of  pension. 

Pilate  weakened. 

Then  he  yielded. 

The  High  Priest  and  his  friends  could  have  their  victim 
and  do  unto  him  whatever  they  wanted. 

The  Council  met  to  debate  upon  the  exact  method  of  exe¬ 
cution. 

As  a  rule,  criminals  were  killed  by  stoning.  But  the  case 
of  Jesus  was  exceptional.  There  must  be  something  humiliat¬ 
ing  in  the  form  of  his  death.  Runaway  slaves  were  nailed 
upon  a  cross  and  were  then  left  hanging  until  they  died  of 
hunger  and  thirst.  It  was  decided  that  Jesus  should  be  cruci¬ 
fied. 

Four  Roman  soldiers  and  a  captain  were  told  to  do  the 
work. 

They  took  Jesus  and  made  him  stand  up. 

Once  more  the  dirty  purple  robe  was  pulled  across  his 
shoulders.  A  crown,  hastily  woven  of  thorns,  was  pressed 
upon  his  head.  A  cross,  made  out  of  two  heavy  beams,  was 
laid  across  his  back. 

There  was  a  wait  until  two  thieves,  condemned  to  die  at  the 
same  time,  had  been  brought  from  their  cells. 

Late  in  the  afternoon,  the  dreadful  procession  began  its 
way  to  the  hill  where  the  gallows  stood.  It  was  called  Gol¬ 
gotha,  from  the  “gulgalta”  or  skulls  which  lay  around. 

Jesus,  weak  from  lack  of  food  and  dizzy  with  the  blows 
and  the  flogging  which  he  had  received,  was  hardly  able  to  walk. 

The  road  was  lined  with  people. 

They  watched  him  as  he  dragged  himself  and  his  cross 
up  the  steep  path  of  the  low  hill. 


410 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


The  tumult  had  died  down. 

The  anger  of  the  mob  had  spent  itself. 
An  innocent  man  was  being  killed. 
There  were  cries  for  mercy. 


THE  ROAD  TO  GOLGOTHA 


But  it  was  too  late. 

The  ghastly  drama  had  to  be  enacted  unto  the  bitter  end. 
Jesus  was  nailed  to  the  cross. 

Over  his  head  the  Homan  soldiers  fastened  a  slip  of  paper, 
carrying  the  words  ‘‘Jesus  of  Nazareth,  King  of  the  Jews.” 

They  wrote  it  down  in  Roman  and  in  Greek  and  in  Hebrew, 
that  all  might  read  it  and  understand.  It  was  meant  as  an 


THE  DEATH  OF  JESUS 


411 


insult  to  the  Pharisees  and  Sadducees,  who  were  responsible 
for  this  terrible  miscarriage  of  justice. 

When  the  last  nail  had  been  driven  in,  the  soldiers  sat  down 
to  gamble.  In  a  wide  circle,  the  people  stood  and  looked. 
Some  of  them  were  merely  curious.  Others  were  former  pupils. 
They  had  ventured  back  into  the  town  to  be  with  their  Master 

at  the  last  moment.  There  were  a  few  women. 


THE  DEATH  OF  JESUS 


It  was  growing  dark  rapidly. 

On  the  cross,  Jesus  was  softly  murmuring  words  which 
few  could  understand.  A  kindly  Roman  soldier  had  soaked 
a  sponge  in  vinegar  and  thrust  it  to  Jesus  on  the  end  of  a 
pike.  Such  a  potion  would  deaden  the  pain  of  his  lacerated 
hands  and  feet,  but  Jesus  refused  it. 


412 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


By  a  last  and  supreme  effort,  he  held  to  his  consciousness. 
And  he  uttered  a  prayer. 

He  asked  that  his  enemies  be  forgiven  for  what  they  had 
done  unto  him. 

Then  he  whispered,  “It  is  finished.” 

And  he  died. 


THE  STRENGTH  OF  AN  IDEA 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

BUT  THE  NEW  WORDS  OF  LOVE  AND  HOPE  WHICH  HAD 
BEEN  WHISPERED  INTO  THE  EARS  OF  AN  UNHAPPY 
HUMANITY  COULD  NOT  BE  SUPPRESSED  BY  THE  ACTS 
OF  ROMAN  GOVERNORS  AND  ENVIOUS  JEWISH 
PRIESTS.  NAY,  NOT  EVEN  THE  EMPEROR  HIMSELF 
COULD  PREVENT  THE  DISCIPLES  OF  JESUS  FROM 
CARRYING  THE  MESSAGE  OF  THEIR  MASTER  TO  ALL 
THOSE  WHO  CARED  TO  LISTEN 


HE  teaching  of  Jesus  was  the  noblest 
expression  of  a  human  soul  seeking 
happiness  in  the  exercise  of  love  and 
justice. 

And  this  accounts  for  the  survival 
and  the  final  triumph  of  an  idea  which 
so  many  people  during  so  many  cen¬ 
turies  have  tried  to  destroy. 

The  world  in  which  Jesus  lived  was  very  badly  balanced. 
Those  who  sat  in  the  seats  of  the  mighty  had  too  much  and 
those  who  lived  in  slavery  had  too  little. 

But  the  latter  outnumbered  the  former  a  thousand  to  one. 

413 


414 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


It  was  among  the  very  poor  that  the  words  of  Jesus  were 
first  heard;  that  his  lessons  of  kindliness,  his  assurance  that  the 
Mighty  Spirit  which  dominates  this  universe  was  a  spirit  of 
love,  were  first  discussed  and  accepted. 

Those  simple  folk  had  never  been  touched  by  the  plausible 
philosophies  of  the  Sceptics  and  the  Epicureans. 

They  could  not  read  and  they  did  not  know  how  to  write. 

They  had  ears,  however,  with  which  to  hear. 

To  their  masters  they  were  httle  better  than  the  cows  graz¬ 
ing  in  the  fields. 

They  lived  and  died  and  were  forgotten  and  no  one  mourned 
their  loss. 

Then  suddenly  the  door  of  their  bondage  was  opened  wide 
and  they  were  given  a  glimpse  of  the  truth  that  all  men  are 
children  of  One  Heavenly  Father. 

As  was  to  be  expected,  the  first  people  to  accept  the  new 
faith  were  those  Jews  who  lived  in  the  same  neighbourhood 
and  who  had  been  able  to  hear  him  and  feel  the  charm  of  his 
words  and  see  the  fearless  Hght  in  his  eyes. 

A  few  centuries  later,  the  Middle  Ages,  in  their  naive  ac¬ 
ceptance  of  all  written  tradition,  conceived  a  fierce  hatred 
for  the  Jews,  because  certain  Jews  had  been  directly  responsible 
for  the  death  of  him  whom  they  called  God’s  son. 

This  attitude  was  utterly  indefensible  as  we  have  since 
come  to  understand. 

Jesus  was  a  Jew.  His  mother  was  a  Jewess.  His  friends 
and  his  disciples  were  Jews. 

He  himself  rarely  left  the  Jewish  community  in  which  he 
had  grown  up.  He  was  quite  willing  to  associate  with  for¬ 
eigners,  with  Greeks  and  Samaritans  and  Phoenicians  and 
Sju'ians  and  Romans,  but  he  lived  and  died  for  his  own  people 
and  lay  buried  in  J ewish  ground. 


THE  PHARISEE  AND  HIS  VICTIM 


THE  STRENGTH  OF  AN  IDEA 


415 


He  was  the  last  and  the  greatest  of  the  J ewish  prophets 
and  a  direct  descendant  of  those  intrepid  spiritual  leaders  who 
had  stepped  forward  at  every  national  crisis. 

No,  those  Pharisees  and  Sadducees  who  killed  Jesus  were 
Jews  only  in  the  most  narrow  and  bigoted  sense  of  the  word. 

They  were  the  selfish  defenders  of  an  intolerant  creed  which 
had  outlived  its  usefulness  by  many  hundred  years. 

They  were  the  self-appointed  administrators  of  an  out¬ 
rageous  monopoly  of  outward  holiness. 

They  committed  a  terrible  crime,  hut  they  committed  it  as 
members  of  a  political  and  a  religious  party,  and  not  as  J ews, 
and  if  they  were  without  rivals  in  their  hatred  for  the  new 
prophet,  others  of  their  race  were  equally  staunch  in  the  love 
which  they  bore  their  murdered  Master. 

And  it  was  among  those  faithful  pupils  living  in  the  land 
of  Galilee  and  of  Jud^a  that  the  first  Christian  community, 
the  first  combination  of  people  who  believed  that  Jesus  was  the 
Christos,  or  Anointed,  was  founded. 

It  is  not  quite  correct  to  speak  in  this  connection  of  a  Chris¬ 
tian  community,  for  that  name  was  not  used  until  several  years 
later  in  the  city  of  Antioch  in  Asia  Minor.  But  the  community 
of  disciples  existed  and  prospered  and  the  members  met  reg¬ 
ularly,  almost  under  the  shadow  of  the  cross,  in  that  same  city 
of  Jerusalem  which  had  sent  Jesus  to  his  terrible  death. 

Soon,  however,  there  were  dissensions  and  httle  groups  were 
formed  by  those  who  shared  the  same  ideas  and  could  not  quite 
agree  with  their  neighbours.  Some,  like  Stephen,  who  was 
familiar  with  the  current  Greek  philosophies,  understood  that 
there  must  be  a  definite  break  between  the  old  and  the  new  and 
that  there  was  not  room  in  their  church  for  the  stern  Jehovah 
of  Moses  and  the  loving  God  whom  Jesus  had  preached. 

But  when  they  said  this,  the  others  arose  in  their  wrath  and 


416 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


killed  them,  for  they  seemed  to  be  in  favour  of  letting  down  all 
barriers  against  foreigners,  and  that  was  still  a  horrible  thing 
in  the  eyes  of  those  whose  childhood  had  been  spent  within  sight 
of  the  old  Temple. 

Presently,  however,  the  breach  widened.  In  less  than  a 
dozen  years  after  the  death  of  Jesus,  his  teachings  had  been 
put  into  a  definite  shape  which  forever  separated  the  Christian 
from  the  Jew,  as  it  separates  him  from  the  Buddhist  or  the 
Mohammedan. 

From  that  moment  on  it  was  comparatively  easy  for  the 
new  doctrine  to  spread  across  western  Asia. 

The  wisdom  of  the  old  Jewish  law  lay  buried  in  the  unknown 
tongue  of  the  forgotten  Hebrew  language. 

But  everything  connected  with  the  “Christos”  was  being 
written  down  in  Greek,  and  Alexander  the  Macedonian  had 
made  that  tongue  the  international  language  of  antiquity. 

The  stage  was  set. 

The  world  of  the  west  was  ready  for  the  message  from  the 
east. 

There  was  need  of  a  man  who  could  carry  Galilee  to  Rome. 

He  came. 

And  his  name  was  Paul. 


I 


THE  TRIUMPH  OF  AN  IDEA 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 

ONE  THING,  HOWEVER,  WAS  NECESSARY  BEFORE  CHRIS¬ 
TIANITY  COULD  BECOME  A  WORLD-RELIGION.  THERE 
MUST  BE  A  BREAK  WITH  JERUSALEM  AND  THE  NAR¬ 
ROW  TRIBAL  PREJUDICES  OF  THE  OLDER  FAITH.  A 
BRILLIANT  SPEAKER  AND  ORGANISER  BY  THE  NAME 
OF  PAUL  SAVED  CHRISTIANITY  FROM  THE  FATE  OF 
DEGENERATION  INTO  ANOTHER  LITTLE  JEWISH 
SECT.  PAUL  LEFT  JUDJEA,  CROSSED  OVER  INTO 
EUROPE  AND  MADE  THE  NEW  CHURCH  AN  INTERNA¬ 
TIONAL  INSTITUTION  WHICH  RECOGNISED  NO  DIF¬ 
FERENCE  BETWEEN  JEW  AND  ROMAN  AND  GREEK 

E  know  Paul  well. 

Historically  speaking,  we  know 
him  really  much  better  than  we  do 
Jesus.  The  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  the 
fifth  book  of  the  New  Testament,  which 
follows  immediately  upon  the  Gospels, 
devotes  sixteen  chapters  to  the  life  and 
the  works  of  Paul.  And  in  the  letters 
written  by  him  when  he  was  travelling  among  the  heathen  of 
the  west,  we  find  a  very  minute  description  of  his  doctrines. 

417 


418 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

He  was  the  son  of  Jewish  parents  who  lived  in  the  city 
of  Tarsus,  in  the  district  of  Cilicia  in  the  northwest  corner 

of  Asia  Minor.  Their  son  was  given  the  name  of  Shaul  or 
Saul. 

He  was  well  connected,  had  relatives  in  several  parts  of  the 
empire,  and  when  quite  young  he  had  been  sent  to  Jerusalem 

to  go  to  school.  Here  his  posi¬ 
tion  was  somewhat  anomalous, 
for  although  a  J ew,  he  happened 
to  be  a  Roman  citizen.  This 
honour  seems  to  have  been  con¬ 
ferred  upon  his  father  for  cer¬ 
tain  services  rendered  to  Rome. 
In  those  days  it  was  a  passport 
which  allowed  the  owner  a  great 
many  privileges. 

After  he  had  finished  his  edu¬ 
cation  (the  conventional  educa¬ 
tion  of  all  Jewish  children)  Saul  was  apprenticed  to  a  tent- 
maker  and  afterwards  he  set  up  for  himself  in  the  same 
business. 

Trained  in  the  strict  school  of  the  Pharisees,  yoimg  Saul 
was  heart  and  soul  with  the  Great  Council  when  they  ordered 
the  execution  of  Jesus.  Afterwards,  he  eagerly  joined  the 
group  of  young  patriots  who  tried  to  eradicate  the  seditious 
doctrines  which  the  hated  Nazarene  had  spread  throughout 
Galilee  and  Judsea. 

He  was  present  when  Stephen  was  stoned  to  death  and 
moved  not  a  finger  to  save  the  poor  man  who  was  the  first 
martyr  to  give  his  life  for  the  new  faith. 

But  as  he  was  for  ever  at  the  head  of  a  band  of  young 
rowdies,  who  in  the  name  of  the  old  law  were  committing  new 


ST.  STEPHEN 


THE  TRIUMPH  OF  AN  IDEA  419 

crimes,  he  came  in  almost  daily  contact  with  the  followers  of 
Jesus. 

These  earhest  Christians,  in  great  contrast  to  most  of  their 
contemporaries,  were  exemplary  in  their  personal  conduct. 

They  lived  sober  and  abstemious  lives,  they  told  no  lies,  they 
gave  liberally  to  the  poor,  they  shafed  their  possessions  with 
their  needy  neighbors  and  went 
to  the  gallows  with  a  prayer 
upon  their  lips  for  those  who 
persecuted  them. 

At  first,  Saul  was  puzzled. 

Then  he  began  to  under¬ 
stand  that  J esus  must  have  been 
something  more  than  a  revolu¬ 
tionary  agitator  to  have  inspired 
such  devotion  in  people  who  had 
never  even  seen  him. 

He  was  a  very  intelligent 
pupil.  Jesus  had  been  a  very  intelligent  teacher.  Suddenly 
Saul  understood  Jesus,  and  surrendered  himself  to  the  will  of 
his  unknown  Master. 

His  conversion  took  place  on  a  lonely  road. 

He  was  on  his  way  to  Damascus.  The  authorities  in 
Jerusalem  had  heard  that  a  number  of  Jews  in  that  city  were 
beginning  to  show  a  leaning  towards  the  Christian  doctrines. 
The  High  Priest  had  given  Saul  letters  to  his  colleague  in 
Damascus  asking  that  those  heretics  be  surrendered  and  be 
brought  to  Jerusalem  for  trial  and  execution. 

Saul  had  gone  upon  this  gruesome  errand  as  happy  as  a 
boy.  But  ere  he  reached  the  capital  of  Syria,  he  had  a  vision. 

His  blind  eyes  became  seeing. 

Jesus  was  right,  and  the  High  Priest  was  wrong. 


DAMASCUS 


420 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


It  was  the  logical  conclusion  to  which  millions  of  people 
have  come  ever  since. 

Instead  of  presenting  his  credentials  and  asking  that  the 
dissenters  be  given  into  his  custody,  Saul  went  straightway  to 
Ananias,  who  was  the  leader  of  the  Damascan  community  and 
begged  that  he  might  be  baptised. 


ANTIOCH 


From  that  moment  on  he  was  called  Paul  and  under  that 
name  he  gained  his  fame  as  the  apostle  to  the  heathen. 

He  gave  up  his  profession  and  at  the  request  of  Barnabas 
(an  early  convert  from  the  island  of  Cyprus)  he  went  to  the 
city  of  Antiochia,  where  the  name  Christians  was  for  the  first 
time  publicly  given  to  those  who  accepted  Jesus  and  no  longer 
worshipped  in  the  old  synagogue. 

Paul  stayed  in  Antioch  only  a  short  time  and  then  com¬ 
menced  that  life  of  a  wandering  missionary  which  carried  him  to 


THE  TRIUMPH  OF  AN  IDEA 


421 


all  the  corners  of  the  Empire  and  gave  him  as  his  final  reward 
a  martyr’s  grave  in  an  unknown  Roman  cemetery. 

At  first  he  worked  chiefly  among  the  coastal  cities  of  Asia 
Minor  and  made  many  converts.  The  Greeks  listened  to  him 
with  evident  pleasure.  They  could  follow  his  line  of  reasoning. 
They  were  impressed  by  the  tact 
he  used  to  overcome  their  objec¬ 
tions  and  willingly  they  joined 
the  new  faith. 

But  the  little  groups  of  Jew- 
ish-Christians  which  were  to  be 
found  in  most  Mediterranean 
ports  hated  Paul  and  did  their 
best  to  make  his  work  a  failure. 

Prejudices  inherited  from 
twenty  generations  of  orthodox 
ancestors  cannot  be  shed  in  a 
minute.  To  those  good  people  it  seemed  that  Paul  was  going 
much  too  far,  that  he  was  too  friendly  to  the  followers  of  Zeus 
and  Mithras,  that  he  should  first  of  all  be  a  Jew  and  that  his 
Christian  ideals  should  be  of  secondary  importance  and  should 
conform  as  closely  as  possible  to  the  old  Mosaic  laws. 

When  Paul  tried  to  prove  to  them  that  the  two  had  nothing 
in  common,  that  one  could  not  serve  Jehovah  and  the  God  of 
Jesus  at  the  same  time,  their  dislike  was  turned  into  open 
hatred. 

Several  times  they  tried  to  kill  the  hated  tent-maker,  until 
Paul  began  to  understand  that  Christianity,  if  it  were  to  sur¬ 
vive,  must  appeal  to  an  entirely  new  public,  and  must  break 
definitely  and  unequivocally  with  Judaism. 

He  still  remained  in  Asia  Minor,  but  finally  in  Troas  (a 


THE  APOSTLE 


422 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


seaport  not  far  from  the  ruins  of  the  old  city  of  Troy  of  which 
Homer  had  simg)  he  made  up  his  mind  to  go  to  Europe. 

He  crossed  the  Hellespont  and  went  straightway  to  Phil¬ 
ippi,  an  important  town  in  the  heart  of  Macedonia. 

He  was  now  in  Alexander’s 
old  country  and  there,  being 
familiar  with  the  Greek  lan¬ 
guage,  he  preached  the  words  of 
Jesus  to  his  first  western  audi¬ 
ence. 

Before  he  had  spoken  more 
than  a  couple  of  times,  he  was 
arrested  and  taken  to  prison. 

But  the  people  had  liked  him 
and  he  was  quietly  allowed  to 
escape. 

Nothing  daunted  by  this  unfortunate  experience,  he  decided 
to  attack  the  enemy  in  their  own  stronghold.  He  went  to 
Athens.  The  Athenians  listened  politely  enough.  But  they 
had  heard  so  many  new  doctrines  during  the  last  four  hundred 
years,  that  missionaries  no  longer  interested  them. 

Paul’s  work  was  never  interfered  with,  but  no  one  stepped 
forward  and  asked  to  be  baptised. 

In  Corinth,  Paul  secured  a  great  success,  as  we  know  from 
the  two  letters  which  afterwards  he  wrote  to  the  Corinthian 
congregation,  and  in  which  he  explained  some  more  of  his 
ideas,  which  as  time  passed  grew  further  and  further  away 
from  those  old  formulas  which  were  still  so  dear  to  the  hearts 
of  the  Jewish- Christians. 

Paul  by  this  time  had  been  several  years  in  Europe. 

The  fundament  for  all  future  missionary  work  had  been 
laid.  He  could  return  to  his  own  world  of  Asia  Minor. 


ST.  PAUL  GOES  ABROAD 


THE  TRIUMPH  OF  AN  IDEA 


423 


First  he  visited  Ephesus,  on  the  western  shore.  In  that 
city  since  time  immemorial  there  had  been  a  shrine  to  Diana. 
Diana  (or  Artemis,  as  the  Greeks  called  her),  the  twin  sister 
of  Apollo,  was  something  more  than  the  goddess  of  the  moon. 
The  people  believed  that  she  could  influence  all  living  matter 


THE  TEMPLE  OF  DIANA 


and  in  their  imagination  she  was  more  powerful  than  her  father 
Zeus,  just  as  during  the  Middle  Ages,  Mary  the  mother  of 
Jesus  was  thought  worthy  of  greater  homage  than  Jesus. 

Paul,  not  knowing  the  conditions  in  the  city,  asked  permis¬ 
sion  to  speak  in  the  local  synagogue.  This  was  granted,  but 
withdrawn  as  soon  as  the  Jews  had  heard  a  few  of  his  sermons. 
He  then  hired  the  lecture  hall  of  a  former  Greek  philosopher 
and  for  three  years  he  conducted  what  one  might  call  the  first 
theological  seminary. 

Ephesus,  like  Jerusalem,  was  a  city  with  a  rehgious  monop¬ 
oly.  The  services  in  the  temple  of  Diana  brought  profit  to 
many  people. 


424 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


There  were  visitors  and  there  were  offerings.  There  was 
a  brisk  trade  in  statues  of  Diana  which  pilgrims  carried  home, 
just  as  to-day  we  buy  statues  of  the  Madonna  in  Lourdes  and 
images  of  Peter  in  Rome. 

This  business  of  course  was  threatened  with  ruin  if  Paul 
should  be  successful  and  should  destroy  the  ancient  belief  in  the 
supernatural  powers  of  the  wonder-working  goddess.  The 
goldsmiths  and  the  silversmiths  and  the  priests  of  the  temple 
did  exactly  what  their  colleagues  of  Jerusalem  had  done  a  few 
years  before.  They  tried  to  kill  Paul  in  the  same  way  as  the 
Pharisees  and  the  Sadducees  had  murdered  J esus. 

Paul,  warned  of  his  danger,  fled.  But  his  work  had  been 
done. 

The  Christian  community  of  Ephesus  was  too  strong  to  be 
destroyed  and  although  Paul  never  visited  the  city  afterwards, 
Ephesus  became  the  most  important  centre  of  the  early  Chris¬ 
tian  world  and  several  of  the  earhest  councils  which  gave  the 
new  doctrines  their  final  shape  were  held  in  this  town,  as  you 
may  read  in  the  chronicles  of  the  second  and  third  centuries 
of  our  era. 

Paul  was  now  growing  older. 

He  had  suffered  many  hardships  and  did  not  know  whether 
he  could  live  much  longer. 

Before  his  death  he  decided  to  visit  once  more  the  scene 
of  his  Master’s  death. 

There  were  many  who  warned  him. 

The  so-called  Christian  community  of  Jerusalem  was  in 
truth  a  branch  of  the  Judaic  faith.  The  very  name  of  Paul 
was  execrated  by  those  who  could  not  forgive  the  apostle  his 
love  for  the  heathen.  His  success  in  Greece  counted  for  noth¬ 
ing  in  a  town  which  was  still  dominated  by  the  spirit  of  the 
Pharisees. 


THE  TRIUMPH  OF  AN  IDEA 


425 


Paul  refused  to  believe  this,  but  as  soon  as  he  had  set  foot 
in  the  Temple,  he  was  recognised  and  a  quickly  gathering 
crowd  threatened  to  lynch  him. 

The  Roman  troops,  however,  came  to  his  rescue  and  took 
him  to  the  castle. 

They  did  not  know  exactly  what  to  do  with  him.  At  first 
they  thought  that  he  was  a  revo¬ 
lutionary  agitator,  come  from 
Egypt  to  Judaea  to  stir  up 
trouble.  But  when  Paul  proved 
that  he  was  a  Roman  citizen, 
they  hastily  offered  their  apolo¬ 
gies  and  removed  the  handcuffs 

him 

as  a  matter  of  precaution. 

Lysias,  the  commander  of 
the  garrison  in  Jerusalem,  found 
himself  in  the  same  predicament 
as  Pilate  a  few  years  before. 

He  had  no  reason  to  proceed  against  Paul,  but  it  was  his 
duty  to  maintain  order. 

He  allowed  Paul  to  be  brought  before  the  Great  Council 
and  once  more  the  town  was  on  the  verge  of  civil  war. 

The  Pharisees  and  the  Sadducees  had  long  since  repented 
of  their  hasty  coalition  brought  about  for  the  purpose  of  killing 
their  common  enemy  Jesus  and  they  had  engaged  in  a  series 
of  bitter  quarrels  which  forever  kept  the  people  of  Jerusalem 
in  a  turmoil  of  religious  excitement. 

Under  those  circumstances  it  was  impossible  for  Paul  to 
expect  a  fair  trial  and  Lysias  wisely  removed  him  to  the  castle 
where  he  was  safe  from  the  mob. 


which  had  been  placed  upon 


PAUL  RETURNS  TO  THE 
TEMPLE 


426 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 

And  then,  as  soon  as  it  could  be  done  without  attracting  too 
much  public  attention,  he  sent  P aul  to  Caesarea  where  the 
procurator  resided. 

Paul  remained  more  than  two  years  in  C^sarea  and  during 
that  time  enjoyed  almost  complete  liberty. 

But  he  grew  tired  of  the  endless  accusations  made  against 

him  by  the  members  of  the 
Sanhedrin  and  finally  he  asked 
that  he  be  taken  to  Rome  and 
allowed  to  explain  his  case  to  the 
Emperor,  as  was  his  good  right 
as  a  Roman  citizen. 

In  the  fall  of  the  year  60, 
Paul  left  for  Rome. 

It  was  a  most  disastrous  voy¬ 
age. 

The  ship  which  carried  the 
apostle  was  shipwrecked  and 
thrown  upon  the  rocks  of  the  island  of  Malta. 

After  three  months’  delay  another  vessel  took  Paul  and  his 
companions  to  the  Italian  mainland  and  in  the  year  61,  Paul 
reached  the  city  of  Rome. 

Here  too  it  seems  that  he  enjoyed  a  great  deal  of  freedom. 
The  Romans  really  had  nothing  against  him.  They  simply 
did  not  want  him  to  be  in  Jerusalem  where  his  presence  might 
have  caused  a  riot.  They  were  not  interested  in  Jewish  the¬ 
ology  and  certainly  did  not  mean  to  try  a  man  for  crimes  which 
were  not  recognised  by  their  own  courts. 

'Now  that  he  was  no  longer  a  menace  to  the  safety  of  the 
state,  he  was  allowed  to  come  and  go  at  will  and  he  made  the 
best  of  this  unexpected  opportunity. 


THE  TRIUMPH  OF  AN  IDEA 


427 


He  rented  a  quiet  room  in  one  of  the  poorer  quarters  and 
once  more  turned  missionary. 

His  courage  during  these  last  years  was  sublime.  He  was 
an  old  man,  almost  broken  by  the  hardships  of  the  past  twenty 
years.  But  the  jail  sentences,  the  scourgings,  the  stoning 
(which  he  had  received  once  with 
almost  fatal  results  at  the  hands 
of  his  own  compatriots) ,  the  end¬ 
less  journeys  on  ship  and  on  foot 
and  on  horseback,  the  hunger 
and  the  thirst,  all  counted  for 
nothing  compared  to  the  oppor¬ 
tunity  of  explaining  the  ideals  of 
Jesus  personally  to  the  capital 
of  the  civilised  world. 

How  long ,  he  continued  to 
preach  or  what  became  of  him 
finally  we  do  not  know. 

In  the  year  64  there  occurred  one  of  those  senseless  anti- 
Christian  outbreaks  which  were  soon  to  be  very  popular.  The 
Emperor  Nero  encouraged  the  mob  when  they  started  out  to 
plunder  and  murder  all  those  who  belonged  to  the  new  faith. 

Paul  seems  to  have  been  one  of  the  victims  of  this  pogrom. 

After  that  day  we  never  hear  his  name  mentioned  again. 

But  the  modern  church  stands  as  a  monument  to  his  genius. 

Paul  was  the  bridge  which  led  from  Galilee  to  Rome.  He 
saved  Christianity  from  degenerating  into  another  little  Jew¬ 
ish  sect. 

He  made  it  the  religion  of  an  entire  world. 


THE  ESTABLISHED  CHURCH 


CHAPTER  XXIX 

SHORTLY  AFTERWARDS,  ANOTHER  DISCIPLE  BY  THE 
NAME  OF  PETER  WENT  TO  ROME  TO  VISIT  THE  SMALL 
COLONY  OF  CHRISTIANS  ON  THE  BANKS  OF  THE 
TIBER.  HE  HIMSELF  PERISHED  DURING  ONE  OF  THE 
MANY  POGROMS  ORGANISED  BY  THE  EMPERORS 
WHEN  THEY  BEGAN  TO  FEAR  THE  INFLUENCE  OF 
THIS  NEW  RELIGIOUS  ORGANISATION.  BUT  THE 
CHURCH  EASILY  SURVIVED  THOSE  ATTACKS.  THREE 
CENTURIES  LATER,  WHEN  ROME  CEASED  TO  BE  THE 
POLITICAL  CENTRE  OF  THE  WESTERN  WORLD,  THE 
CHRISTIAN  BISHOPS  OF  THE  CITY  MADE  THEIR  RESI¬ 
DENCE  THE  SPIRITUAL  CAPITAL  OF  THE  ENTIRE 
WORLD 


r  Peter,  whose  name  is  so  closely  con¬ 
nected  with  the  change  of  our  spiritual 
centre  from  Jerusalem  to  Rome,  we 
know  much  less  than  we  do  of  Paul. 

We  saw  him  last  when  in  terrible 
distress  he  fled  from  the  house  of 
Caiaphas  after  he  had  just  denied  that 
he  knew  Jesus.  Then  we  catch  a 
glimpse  of  him  at  the  crucifixion.  Thereafter  for  many  years 

we  lose  sight  of  him  altogether,  until  he  turns  up  as  a  very 

128 


THE  ESTABLISHED  CHURCH 


429 


successful  missionary,  writing  very  interesting  letters  from  dis¬ 
tant  cities  whither  he  had  travelled  to  preach  the  words  of  his 
Master. 

A  man  of  much  less  education  than  Paul,  a  simple  fisherman 
from  the  Sea  of  Galilee,  Peter  lacked  that  personal  magnetism 
which  made  Paul  the  dominating  figure  of  every  society  in 
which  he  moved,  whether  Jewish 
or  Greek  or  Roman  or  Cilician. 

But  his  momentary  coward¬ 
ice  at  the  trial  of  Jesus  must  not 
make  us  decide  that  Peter  was 
lacking  in  courage. 

Some  of  the  bravest  soldiers 
and  some  of  the  most  famous 
regiments  have  done  strange 
things  at  unexpected  moments. 

Afterwards,  however,  when  rea¬ 
son  has  come  back,  they  have  in¬ 
variably  made  up  for  their  sudden  fall  from  grace  by  a  renewed 
faithfulness  to  duty. 

And  so  with  Peter. 

Besides,  he  was  a  man  of  parts  who  did  a  very  useful  piece  of 
work  in  a  very  elRcient  manner.  Being  aware  of  his  own  limi¬ 
tations  he  left  the  more  spectacular  work  to  Paul,  who  spent  his 
days  abroad,  and  to  James,  the  brother  of  Jesus,  who  had 
become  the  acknowledged  head  of  the  church  in  the  old  country. 

Meanwhile,  he  contented  himself  with  the  less  important 
countries  on  the  outskirts  of  Judaea,  and  together  with  his 
faithful  wife,  he  trudged  the  long  roads  from  Babylon  to 
Samaria  and  from  Samaria  to  Antioch  and  told  the  people 
what  Jesus  had  taught  him  in  the  old  days  when  they  fished 
together  in  the  Sea  of  Galilee. 


430 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


What  finally  brought  him  to  Rome,  we  do  not  know. 

In  a  strict  historical  sense,  we  have  no  reliable  data  upon 
this  voyage  of  Peter.  But  the  name  of  the  apostle  is  so  closely 
connected  with  the  early  development  of  the  church  as  a  world¬ 
wide  institution,  that  we  must  devote  a  few  words  to  this 
wonderful  old  man  whom  Jesus  had  loved  beyond  all  others. 

A  chronicler  who  wrote  in  the  middle  of  the  second  century 
mentions  that  Peter  and  Paul  had  worked  in  Rome  at  the  same 
time  and  had  been  killed  by  the  mob  within  a  few  months  of 
each  other. 

Such  wholesale  killing  of  the  heretics  was  a  new  departure 
in  Roman  history. 

The  former  indifference  of  the  Roman  government  toward 
the  followers  of  Jesus  was  gradually  beginning  to  turn  into 
hatred. 

As  long  as  the  Christians  had  been  merely  ‘^queer  people” 
who  came  together  occasionally  in  obscure  houses  in  equally 
obscure  parts  of  the  town  to  inspire  each  other  with  stories 
about  a  Messiah  who  had  died  the  death  of  a  runaway  slave, 
no  danger  was  to  be  feared  from  their  meetings. 

But  as  gradually  the  words  of  Christ  began  to  reach  more 
and  more  people,  there  was  an  end  to  the  patience  of  the 
authorities. 

It  was  the  old,  old  story. 

First  of  all,  those  who  depended  for  their  living  upon  the 
worship  of  Jupiter  began  to  complain.  They  were  losing 
money.  The  temples  were  being  deserted.  The  Romans  were 
giving  all  their  gold  to  a  foreign  divinity  of  very  obscure  origin 
and  the  loss  on  the  part  of  the  cattle-dealers  and  the  priests 
was  very  serious. 

Having  assured  themselves  of  the  co-operation  of  the  police, 
the  interested  parties  then  began  a  campaign  of  slander  against 


THE  ESTABLISHED  CHURCH 


431 


the  Christians.  The  half-savage  mob  of  disinherited  peasants, 
living  miserably  in  the  suburbs,  was  delighted  to  hear  such 
vile  accusations  against  those  of  their  neighbours  who  offended 
them  by  the  decency  of  their  conduct.  These  people  winked 
at  one  another  meaningly  when  one  Roman  housewife  told 
another  how  'Those  Christians  kill  little  children  every  Sunday 
and  drink  the  blood,  just  to 
please  their  god,”  and  sug¬ 
gested  that  the  time  had  come  to 
“do  something.” 

It  mattered  little  that  all  the 
reliable  authors  of  that  day 
agreed  upon  the  saintliness  of 
the  lives  of  their  Christian  neigh¬ 
bours,  and  held  them  up  as  an 
example  to  those  Romans  who 
were  for  ever  bewailing  the  dis¬ 
appearance  of  the  “good  old 
times”  while  practicing  all  the  vices  of  the  bad  new  days. 

But  there  was  still  another  and  a  more  powerful  group 
which  from  purely  selfish  motives  feared  the  success  of  Chris¬ 
tianity.  The  necromancers  and  the  oriental  mystics  and  the 
purveyors  of  a  hundred  new  mysteries  which  they  had  only 
recently  imported  “exclusively”  from  the  east,  found  that  their 
business  was  being  ruined.  How  could  they  hope  to  compete 
with  a  group  of  men  and  women  who  by  preference  lived  in 
poverty  and  who  refused  to  charge  a  single  denarius  for  ex¬ 
plaining  the  doctrines  of  their  Galilean  teacher? 

All  these  different  parties,  inspired  by  greed,  soon  made 
common  cause  and  went  to  the  authorities  and  denounced  the 
Christians  as  wicked  and  seditious  criminals  who  were  plotting 
against  the  safety  of  the  Empire. 


432 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


The  Roman  authorities  were  not  easily  frightened  and  for  a 
long  time  they  showed  great  unwillingness  to  take  definite 
action.  But  the  strange  stories  about  the  Christians  continued 
to  be  repeated,  first  here  and  then  there,  and  with  such  a  wealth 
of  detail  that  they  seemed  to  be  based  upon  solid  fact. 

Meanwhile  the  Christians  themselves,  in  their  zeal  for  a  new 
and  better  world,  helped  those  suspicions  along  by  certain  deep 
and  dark  references  to  the  Day  of  Judgment  when  the  entire 
planet  was  to  be  purged  by  the  lightning  from  Heaven. 

When  Nero,  in  a  drunken  fit,  set  fire  to  the  greater  part  of 
his  own  capital,  people  remembered  those  Christian  prophecies 
which  had  foretold  the  destruction  of  all  the  big  cities. 

In  an  outburst  of  fear,  the  Romans  lost  all  sense  of  reality. 

Jews  and  Christians  were  hunted  down  like  rats  and  were 
thrown  into  jail.  Torture  made  them  confess  the  most  incred¬ 
ible  plots  against  the  state.  For  weeks  at  a  time  the  execu¬ 
tioners  and  the  wild  animals  were  kept  busy  and  it  was  upon 
one  of  these  occasions  that  Paul  and  Peter  both  were  hacked 
to  death. 

But  as  the  Romans  were  to  learn,  steadfast  martyrs  are 
the  best  possible  advertisement  for  a  new  creed.  Thus  far  the 
Christian  doctrines  had  found  most  of  their  adherents  in  the 
kitchen.  Now  the  parlour  began  to  take  an  interest.  Before 
the  end  of  the  first  century,  many  high  officials  and  women  of 
noble  rank  had  been  executed  because  they  were  suspected  of 
Christian  leanings  and  had  been  unwilling  to  show  their  loyalty 
to  the  Empire  by  offerings  to  the  old  gods. 

Persecution  caused  resentment  and  the  Christians,  who 
in  the  beginning  had  been  very  meek  and  humble,  began  at 
last  to  take  steps  to  defend  themselves.  When  it  was  no  longer 
safe  to  gather  in  the  open  air  or  in  the  dining-room  of  a  private 
house,  the  church  went  underground. 


THE  CHURCH  GOES  UNDERGROUND 


THE  ESTABLISHED  CHURCH 


433 


Deserted  stone  quarries  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Rome  were 
hastily  transformed  into  chapels  and  there  the  faithful  came 
together  once  a  week  to  listen  to  the  sermons  of  some  pious 
wandering  minister,  and  to  find  comfort  in  repeating  the  stories 
told  a  hundred  years  before  by 
the  carpenter  from  Nazareth. 

This  made  all  Christians 
members  of  a  secret  society, 
something  which  they  had  never 
been  before. 

The  Roman  officials,  for 
good  and  plentiful  reasons, 
feared  secret  societies  beyond  all 
other  things.  In  a  country 
where  eighty  per  cent  of  the  peo¬ 
ple  were  slaves,  it  was  not  safe 
to  allow  surreptitious  meetings  which  could  not  be  controlled 
by  the  police  sergeant. 

Reports  began  to  come  in  from  the  provinces  about  the 
spread  of  the  Christian  affliction.  A  few  wise  governors  kept 
their  heads  and  quietly  waited  until  the  people  had  regained 
their  senses.  Others  allowed  themselves  to  be  bribed  into  silence 
by  their  Christian  subjects.  Still  others  arranged  pogroms 
and  tried  to  find  favour  in  the  eyes  of  the  Emperor  by  the 
wholesale  execution  of  men  and  women  and  children,  who  in 
any  way  could  be  connected  with  the  suspicious  “Galilean 
mystery.” 

And  everywhere  and  all  the  time  the  authorities  met  with 
the  same  response  on  the  part  of  their  victims.  Invariably  they 
denied  all  guilt  and  their  magnificent  behaviour  on  the  scaffold 
made  them  so  many  friends  that  public  executions  were  always 


434 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


followed  by  an  increased  number  of  candidates  for  the  Chris¬ 
tian  brotherhood. 

Indeed,  when  the  persecutions  came  to  an  end,  the  small 
congregations  had  grown  to  such  proportions  that  it  became 
necessary  to  appoint  certain  officers  whose  business  it  was  to 
represent  the  church  before  the  law  and  to  administer  those 
funds  which  pious  people  were  giving  for  charity  and  for 
the  relief  of  the  sick. 

First  a  few  of  the  older  men,  the  so-called  ‘‘Elders,”  were 
asked  to  undertake  the  management  of  the  daily  affairs  of  the 
community.  Next,  for  the  sake  of  a  more  effectual  co-oper¬ 
ation,  a  number  of  churches  in  a  given  town  or  in  a  given 
district  combined  forces  and  appointed  a  Bishop  or  general 
overseer  to  direct  their  common  policy. 

These  bishops,  by  the  very  nature  of  their  office,  were  sup¬ 
posed  to  be  the  direct  successors  of  the  apostles.  Naturally, 
as  the  church  grew  richer,  their  power  increased.  And  of 
course,  the  bishop  of  a  village  in  J udsea  or  Asia  Minor  had  less 
influence  than  the  bishop  of  a  big  city  in  Italy  or  France. 

It  was  inevitable  that  the  other  bishops  should  come  to 
regard  their  colleague  in  Rome  with  a  certain  amount  of  awe 
and  respect.  It  was  also  inevitable  that  in  Rome,  the  city 
which  had  been  accustomed  to  rule  the  destinies  of  the  world 
for  almost  five  hundred  years,  there  should  be  a  larger  number 
of  men  experienced  in  statecraft  and  in  diplomacy. 

And  it  was  only  logical  during  the  days  of  Rome’s  decline, 
when  there  was  no  longer  a  chance  for  energetic  young  men 
to  make  a  career  in  the  army  or  in  the  civil  service,  that  they 
should  turn  to  the  church  to  find  an  outlet  for  their  ambitions 
and  their  need  of  enterprise. 

For  most  unfortunately,  the  old  Empire  had  fallen  upon 
evil  days 


THE  CHURCH  CONQUERS  THE  TEMPLE 


THE  ESTABLISHED  CHURCH 


435 


Bad  economic  management  had  impoverished  the  small 
farmers  who  from  the  beginning  of  the  republic  had  been  the 
mainstay  of  the  armies  and  who  now  flocked  to  the  cities,  clam¬ 
ouring  for  bread  and  amusements. 

Disturbances  in  the  heart  of  Asia  had  driven  large  hordes 
of  barbarians  westward  and  these  were  steadily  encroaching 
upon  territory  which  for  generations  had  been  in  the  possession 
of  Rome.  But  the  disorganisa¬ 
tion  in  the  provinces  was  as 
nothing  compared  to  pohtical 
conditions  in  the  capital.  One 
Emperor  after  another  was  first 
placed  upon  the  throne  and  then 
killed  within  the  walls  of  his  pal¬ 
ace  by  the  foreign  mercenaries 
who  were  the  real  masters  of  the 
Empire. 

At  last  it  was  no  longer  con¬ 
sidered  safe  for  the  Roman  Em¬ 
perors  to  reside  in  their  own 

city.  The  successors  of  Cagsar  left  the  shores  of  the  Tiber  and 
went  to  hve  elsewhere.  When  that  happened,  the  bishops  of 
Rome  automatically  became  the  most  influential  men  of  their 
community  and  assumed  full  leadership.  They  represented  the 
only  well  organised  power  that  was  left  and  the  Emperors, 
removed  from  their  old  capital,  needed  their  support  to  retain 
a  semblance  of  prestige  in  the  Italian  peninsula. 

They  were  willing  to  make  a  bid  for  it. 

In  the  year  313,  a  formal  edict  of  tolerance  made  an  end 
to  all  further  persecution.  A  century  later  Rome  was  acknowl¬ 
edged  as  the  spiritual  capital  of  east  and  west  and  north 
and  south. 


ROME  THE  SPIRITUAL 
CENTRE 


436 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


The  Church  stood  triumphant. 

And  ever  since,  above  the  noise  of  battle  and  strife,  have 
been  heard  the  words  of  the  prophet  of  Nazareth,  asking  those 
who  loved  him  to  cure  the  ills  of  this  world  by  that  perfect  love 
which  understands  all  things. 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE  43T 


438 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


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THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


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A  BIBLICAL  READING  LIST  FOR  CHILDREN 

Selected  by 

Leonore  St.  John  Power 


“I  daresay,  after  all,  that  the  best  way  is  not  to  bother  a  boy  too 
early  and  overmuch  with  history ;  that  the  best  way  is  to  let  him  ramp 
at  first  through  the  Scriptures  even  as  he  might  through  ‘The  Arabian 
Nights’:  to  let  him  take  the  books  as  they  come,  merely  indicating,  for 
instance,  that  Job  is  a  great  poem,  the  Psalms  great  lyrics,  the  story 
of  Ruth  a  lovely  idyll,  the  Song  of  Songs  the  perfection  of  an  Eastern 
love-poem.  Well,  and  what  then?  He  will  certainly  get  less  of  ‘The 
Cotter’s  Saturday  Night’  into  it,  and  certainly  mpre  of  the  truth  of 
the  East.  There  he  will  feel  the  whole  splendid  barbaric  story  for 
himself :  the  flocks  of  Abraham  and  Laban:  the  trek  of  Jacob’s  sons  to 
Egypt  for  corn:  the  figures  of  Rebekah  at  the  well,  Ruth  at  the  glean¬ 
ing,  and  Rispah  beneath  the  gibbet :  Sisera  bowing  in  weariness :  Saul 
— great  Saul — by  the  tent-prop  with  the  jewels  in  his  turban: 

“All  its  lordly  male-sapphires,  and  rubies  courageous  at  heart.” 

“The  Art  of  Reading,”  G.  P.  Putnam’s  Sons;  by  Sir  Arthur  Quiller-Couch. 

THE  BIBLE 

The  Holy  Bible ;  containing  the  Old  and  New  Testaments  translated  out 
of  the  original  tongues :  and  with  the  former  translations  dili¬ 
gently  compared  and  revised  by  His  Majesty’s  special  command. 
Oxford  University  Press. 

The  Twenty-Four  Books  of  the  Holy  Scriptures,  by  Isaac  Leeser. 
Block  Publishing  Co.  Carefully  translated  according  to  the 
Massoretic  text,  on  the  basis  of  the  English  version  after  the 
best  Jewish  authorities. 

The  Modern  Reader’s  Bible,  by  Richard  G.  Moulton.  The  Mac¬ 
millan  Co. 


440 


A  BIBLICAL  READING  LIST  FOR  CHILDREN 


441 


A  fine  rendering  of  the  Old  and  New  Testament  into  a  modern 
literary  form.  Two  volumes  of  stories  from  the  Old  and  the 
New  Testament  make  up  the  Children’s  Series  in  this  collection. 

The  Bible  for  Young  People:  arranged  from  the  King  James  Version 
with  twenty-four  full  page  illustrations  from  old  masters.  The 
Century  Co. 

A  very  satisfactory  edition  printed  in  large  tj’pe.  The  Stories 
are  given  in  Bible  language  omitting  only  genealogies  and  doc¬ 
trines  and  whatever  is,  generally  regarded  as  unprofitable  to 
young  readers. 

The  Dore  Bible  Gallery,  illustrated  by  Gustave  Dore.  William  T. 
Amies. 

One  hundred  illustrations,  and  a  page  of  explanatory  text  facing 
each.  This  wonderfully  vivid  presentation  of  Biblical  scenes 
is  now  out  of  print  but  may  sometimes  be  found  in  second-hand 
book  shops. 

A  Child’s  Guide  to  the  Bible,  by  George  Hodges.  The  Baker  & 
Taylor  Co. 

An  interesting  account  of  how  the  Bible  came  to  be  written,  to¬ 
gether  with  an  account  of  the  historical  settings  of  the  Old  and 
the  New  Testaments. 

STORIES  FROM  THE  BIBLE 

The  Garden  of  Eden,  by  George  Hodges,  illustrated  by  Walter  H. 
Everett.  Houghton  Mifflin  Co. 

Stories  from  the  first  nine  books  of  the  Old  Testament  told  sympa¬ 
thetically  and  dramatically  in  very  good  style. 

The  Castle  of  Zion,  by  George  Hodges.  Houghton  Mifflin  Co. 

More  stories  from  the  Old  Testament. 

Bible  Stories  to  Read  and  Tell,  selected  and  arranged  by  Frances 
Jenkins  Olcott.  Houghton  Mifflin  Co. 

These  stories  are  selected  from  the  King  James  Version  of  the 
Old  Testament.  The  powerful  language  and  forceful  imagery 
of  the  original  is  well  preserved. 

The  Children’s  Bible,  translated  and  arranged  by  Henry  A.  Sherman 
and  Charles  Foster  Kent.  Charles  Scribner’s  Sons. 

Telling  Bible  Stories,  by  Louise  Seymour.  Charles  Scribner’s  Sons. 

A  study  of  the  relation  of  children  to  the  stories  of  the  Old  Testa¬ 
ment,  and  an  interpretation  of  the  stories  for  religious  teaching. 


442 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


THE  COUNTRIES  OF  THE  BIBLE 

The  Book  of  the  Ancient  World,  by  Dorothy  Mills,  with  illustrations 
and  maps.  G.  P.  Putnam’s  Sons. 

An  interesting  and  well  arranged  account  of  the  Egyptians,  the 
Assyrians  and  the  Babylonians,  the  Hebrews,  the  Persians  and 
the  Phoenicians. 

Ancient  Assyria,  by  Rev.  James  Baikie. ,  A.  &  C.  Black. 

A  description  of  an  Assyrian  city  2800  years  ago. 

The  Civilization  of  the  Ancient  Egyptians,  by  A.  Bothwell  Gosse. 
T.  &  C.  Jack. 

A  fascinating  book,  profusely  illustrated,  telling  of  the  domestic 
life,  the  art,  the  science,  the  religion  and  the  literature  of  the 
ancient  Egyptians. 

Legends  of  Ancient  Egypt,  by  F.  H.  Brooksbank.  Thomas  Y.  Crowell. 

“In  all  about  them  the  Egyptians  saw  the  hand  of  God — in  the 
rising  of  the  Nile  and  the  fertilizing  soil;  in  bird  and  beast,  in 
sun  and  moon,  in  sky  and  earth  and  sea.” 

Ancient  Man,  by  Hendrik  Willem  van  Loon.  Boni  and  Liveright. 

How  the  human  race  developed  through  the  ages  and  finally 
founded  Jerusalem,  the  City  of  Law,  and  Damascus,  the  City 
of  Trade. 

Our  Young  Folk’s  Josephus,  simplified  by  William  Shepard.  J.  B. 
Lippincott. 

An  abstract  of  the  two  great  works  of  Flavius  Josephus,  “The 
Jewish  War”  and  “The  Antiquities  of  the  Jews,”  written  A.D. 
75-A.D.  93  to  familiarize  the  Roman  people  with  the  history 
of  the  Jews  as  it  is  recorded  in  the  Scripture. 

Jewish  Fairy  Tales  and  Legends  by  Aunt  Naomi.  Bloch  Publishing  Co. 

Charming  legends  dealing  with  the  boyish  exploits  of  the  great 
Biblical  characters,  Abraham,  Moses  and  David,  rewritten  from 
stories  in  the  Talmud  and  Midrash. 

The  Arabian  Nights,  selected  and  edited  by  Padraic  Colum,  illustrated 
by  Eric  Pape.  The  Macmillan  Co. 

Tales  of  wonder  and  magnificence  which  form,  not  a  book,  but 
a  whole  literature  which  goes  back  to  Persia  and  China  and 
India,  as  well  as  to  Arabia  and  Egypt,  for  its  origins. 

Ottoman  Wonder  Tales,  translated  and  edited  by  Lucy  M.  J.  Garnett, 
with  illustrations  in  colour  by  Charles  Folkard.  A.  &  C.  Black. 


A  BIBLICAL  READING  LIST  FOR  CHILDREN 


443 


‘‘There  are  religious  and  semi-religious  legends  connected  with 
the  Prophet  Mohammed  and  his  family  and  with  the  holy  men 
of  Islam;  mythical  stories  concerning  the  magical  exploits  of 
King  David  and  King  Solomon ;  wild  romances  concerning 
Djinns,  Peris  and  all  allied  Supernals;  fables  with  a  moral  and 
humorous  stories  innumerable.” 

Eastern  Stories  and  Legends,  selected  and  adapted  by  Marie  L.  Shed- 
lock.  E.  P.  Dutton  &  Co. 

“Long,  long  ago  the  Wisdom  Child  that  should  in  time  become  the 
Buddha  was  born  a  King.” 

The  Golden  Age  of  Myth  and  Legend,  by  Thomas  Bulfinch.  George  G. 
Harrap  &  Co. 

The  Adventures  of  Odysseus  or  The  Children’s  Homer,  by  Padraic 
Colum,  illustrated  in  colour  and  black  and  white  by  Willy 
Pogany. 

An  attractive,  poetically  rendered  edition  of  this  great  story. 

Pictures  from  Greek  Life  and  Story,  by  The  Rev.  A.  J.  Church.  G.  P. 
Putnam’s  Sons. 

Pictures  from  Roman  Life  and  Story,  by  The  Rev.  A.  j.  Church. 
D.  Appleton  &  Co. 

The  Story  of  Mankind,  by  Hendrik  Willem  van  Loon.  Boni  and 
Liveright. 

“History  is  the  mighty  Tower  of  Experience,  which  Time  has  built 
amidst  the  endless  fields  of  bygone  ages.” 

THE  DAWN  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

When  the  King  Came,  by  George  Hodges.  Houghton  Mifflin  Co. 

Stories  from  the  Four  Gospels  telling  how  the  King  was  born, 
how  He  lived  unknown  for  thirty  years,  how  He  went  about  the 
land  of  Galilee  with  His  Discipl  es,  and  how  He  came  to  Jerusa¬ 
lem  and  was  betrayed. 

The  Story  of  Jesus,  by  Rosa  Mulholland.  Benziger  Brothers. 

Simply  and  reverently  told  for  little  children. 

The  Story  of  Jesus,  pictures  and  descriptive  text  from  the  New  Testa¬ 
ment,  selected  and  arranged  by  Ethel  Nathalie  Dana.  Marshall 
Jones  Co. 

Exceptionally  beautiful  colored  prints  from  the  old  masters, 
Giotto,  Fra  Angelico,  Duccio,  Ghirlandaio,  and  Barna  da  Siena. 
A  distinctive  contribution  to  both  art  and  literature  for 
children. 


444 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


I'he  Life  of  Our  Saviour  Jesus  Christ,  three  hundred  and  sixty-five 
compositions  from  the  Four  Gospels  with  notes  and  explanatory 
drawings  by  J.  James  Tissot.  4  volumes.  The  McClure-Tis- 
sot  Co. 

J.  James  Tissot  was  so  attracted  by  the  figure  of  Jesus  and  the. 
touching  scenes  recorded  in  the  Gospels  that  he  went  to  Pales¬ 
tine  in  1886  hoping  to  trace  in  the  landscape  and  the  character 
of  the  inhabitants  the  scenes  of  antiquity.  The  result  is  four 
volumes  of  colorful  drawings  and  many  beautiful  studies  in 
black  and  white  depicting  the  life  of  Christ. 

The  Christ-Child  in  Art,  by  Henry  Van  Dyke.  Harper  and  Brothers. 

An  interesting  and  unusual  book,  not  written  for  children  but 
much  concerned  with  them,  showing  the  influence  of  the  Christ 
Story  upon  the  art  of  the  old  and  new  masters  of  painting. 
Fully  illustrated. 

Christ  Legends,  by  Selma  Lagerlof.  Henry  Holt  &  Co. 

Rarely  beautiful  stories  including  “The  Emperor’s  Vision,”  “Saint 
Veronica’s  Kerchief”  and  “Robin  Redbreast.” 


CHAMPIONS  OF  CHRISTENDOM 

Child’s  Book  of  Saints,  by  William  Canton,  illustrated  by  T.  H. 
Robinson. 

Stories  of  angels,  hermits,  abbots  and  kings  whose  faith  brought 
about  strange  miracles. 

Stories  of  the  Saints,  by  Miss  Caroline  Van  Dusen. 

“By  request  of  the  Rev.  Phillips  Brooks  this  book  is  dedicated  to 
the  children  of  Trinity  Sunday  School,  Boston,  for  whom  it  was 
written.” 

Pilgrim’s  Progress,  by  John  Bunyan,  with  four  coloured  and  several 
other  illustrations  by  H.  J.  Ford.  The  Macmillan  Co. 

An  attractive  edition  for  children  arranged  by  Jean  Marian 
Matthew. 

The  Seven  Champions  of  Christendom,  edited  by  F.  H.  Darton. 

How  St.  George,  St.  Denis,  St.  James,  St.  Anthony,  St.  Andrew, 
St.  Patrick  and  St.  David  fought  with  enchanters  and  evil 
spirits  to  preserve  the  Kingdom  of  God. 

The  Age  of  Chivalry,  by  Thomas  Bulfinch.  Lothrop,  Lee  and  Shepard. 

Part  1,  King  Arthur  and  His  Knights;  Part  2,  The  Mabinogion; 


A  BIBLICAL  READING  LIST  FOR  CHILDREN 


445 


Part  3,  Kniffhts  of  English  History — Kins;  Richard  and  the 
Third  Crusade. 

The  Boy’s  King  Arthur,  edited  by  Sidney  Lanier,  illustrated  by  N.  C. 
Wyeth.  Charles  Scribner’s  Sons, 

“It  is  in  these  tales  that  we  get  our  earliest  glimpses  of  the  modern 
gentleman,  the  modern  soldier,  the  modern  patriot,  the  modern 
lover.” 

The  Story  of  the  Grail  and  the  Passing  of  Arthur,  written  and  illus¬ 
trated  by  Howard  Pyle.  Charles  Scribner’s  Sons. 

“But  now  hath  the  time  come  that  he  must  quit  us,  for  the  period 
is  imminent  when  the  search  for  the  Holy  Grail  shall  be  begun, 
and  this  is  he  who  shall  achieve  the  Grail.” 

Stories  of  Charlemagne  and  the  Twelve  Peers  of  France,  by  The  Rev. 
A.  J.  Church.  The  Macmillan  Co. 

Stories  from  the  old  French  and  English  chronicles  telling  of  the 
great  Charlemagne  and  his  crusades  against  the  Saracens. 

The  Story  of  Roland,  by  James  Baldwin.  Charles  Scribner’s  Sons. 

“Taillefer,  who  sang  very  well,  rode  before  the  Duke,  singing  of 
Charlemagne  and  of  Roland  and  of  Oliver,  and  of  the  vassals 
who  died  at  Roncevaux.” 

Una  and  the  Red  Cross  Knight  and  Other  Tales  from  Spenser’s  Faery 
Queene,  retold  by  N.  G.  Royde-Smith,  illustrated  by  T.  H.  Rob¬ 
inson.  E.  P.  Dutton  &  Co. 

“His  silver  shield  bore  the  dints  of  many  a  fierce  blow  given  in 
battle  and  on  his  throat  he  wore  a  blood-red  cross,  so  that  men 
called  him  from  that  time  The  Red  Cross  Knight.” 

Stories  from  the  Chronicle  of  the  Cid,  by  Mary  Wright  Plummer. 
Henry  Holt  &  Co. 

Telling  of  the  great  Spanish  hero  Rodrigo  Diaz  de  Bivar,  called 
El  Seid,  and  his  victory  over  twenty-nine  Moorish  Kings. 

Jerusalem  and  the  Crusades,  by  Estelle  Blyth,  with  eight  plates  in 
colour  by  L.  D.  Luard  and  a  series  of  reproductions  of  pictures 
of  historic  interest.  T.  C.  &  E.  C.  Jack. 

The  Book  of  Saints  and  Heroes,  by  Mrs.  Lang.  Longmans  Green  & 
Co. 

“When  Christianity  came  first  to  be  known  to  the  Greeks  and 
Romans,  and  Germans  and  Highlanders,  they,  believing  in  fairies 
and  in  all  manner  of  birds  and  beasts  that  could  talk,  and  in 
everything  wonderful,  told  about  their  Christian  teachers  a 
number  of  fairy  tales.” 


446 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Saints  and  Heroes  to  the  End  of  the  Middle  Ages,  by  George  Hodges. 
Henry  Holt  &  Co. 

Stories  of  Cyprian,  Ambrose,  Chrysostom,  Gregory  the  Great, 
Wycliffe,  Savonarola  and  others. 

Saints  and  Heroes  Since  the  Middle  Ages,  by  George  Hodges.  Henry 
Holt  &  Co. 

Luther,  Loyola,  Calvin,  William  the  Silent,  Cromwell,  Bunyan, 
Fox,  Wesley  and  others. 

FESTIVAL  AND  SONG 

Divine  and  Moral  Songs  for  Children,  by  The  Rev.  Isaac  Watts,  D.D. 
L.  C.  Page  &  Co. 

Spiritual  teaching  in  a  very  attractive  form. 

The  Children’s  Hymnal,  by  Eleanor  Smith,  C.  H.  Farnsworth  and 
C.  A.  Fullerton.  American  Book  Co. 

Carols,  by  William  J.  Phillips.  E.  P.  Dutton  &  Co. 

Their  origin,  music,  and  connection  with  mystery  plays. 

Christmas  Carols,  selected  and  edited  by  L.  Edna  Walter,  harmonised 
by  Lucy  E.  Broadwood,  illustrated  by  J.  H.  Hartley.  The 
Macmillan  Co. 

Old  English  Carols  for  Christmas  and  other  Festivals. 

Festivals,  Holy  Days  and  Saints’  Days,  by  Ethel  L.  Urbin.  Simpkin, 
Marshall,  Hamilton,  Kent  &  Co. 

A  study  in  origins  and  survivals  in  Church  ceremonies  and  secular 
customs. 

Apples  and  Honey,  edited  by  Nina  Salaman.  Doubleday,  Page  &  Co. 

A  collection  of  stories,  poems,  historical  and  biographical  material 
collected  from  various  Jewish  writers. 

Festival  Stories  of  Child  Life  in  the  Jewish  Colony  in  Palestine,  by 
Hannah  Trager,  with  a  preface  by  The  Very  Rev.  Dr.  Hertz, 
Chief  Rabbi.  E.  P.  Dutton  &  Co. 

‘‘The  human  appeal  of  these  tales  is  sure  to  give  the  Jewish  child 
who  reads  them  a  deeper  affection  for  the  Sacred  Occasions  of 
the  Jewish  Year.” 


New  York  City.  September,  1923. 


INDEX 


A 


Aaron  . 73,  77,  78,  87,  92,  97 

Abednego  .  260 

Abel  .  17 

Abigail  .  166 

Abijam .  209 

Abimelech  .  126 

Abraham  . 26-41 

Absalom  . ...177-179 

Achan  .  105 

Achish .  167 

Adam . 16-19 

Adonijah . 177,  180 

Adoration  of  the  Magi .  341 

Agag .  155 

Ahab . 213,  217,  218,  220,  223-225 

Ahasuerus  (see  Xerxes) 

Ahaz  .  235 

Ahaziah  .  225 

Ahijah  .  197 

Ahriman  .  290 

Ai .  105 

Alexander  . 291-294 

Alexander  Jannaeus .  314 

Alexandra  .  315 

Alexandria  .  333 

Amalekites  . 86,  155 

Ammonites . 32,  128 

Amos . 231,  233-235 

Ananias  .  420 

Andrew  .  367 

Anna .  342 

Annas  . 402 

Antigonus  .  314 


Antioch,  Paul  in  .  420 

Antiochus  Epiphanes . 295,  297-306 

Antipater .  320 

Aram  . 231,  232 

Ararat,  Mt .  22 

Arioch  .  260 

Aristobulus . . 313,  315-318 

Ark,  Noah’s .  20 

Ark  of  the  Covenant  93,  140,  172,  185,  187 

Armageddon .  228 

Artaxerxes  .  293 

Asa  .  209 

Ashtaroth  .  169 

Ashurnasirpal .  231 

Assyria,  earliest  history .  4 

Athaliah  . 214,  226 

Athens,  Paul  in .  422 

B 

Baal . 213,  218-220,  229 

Baasha  . 210-212 

Babylonia,  earliest  history .  4 

Babylonian  captivity  . 242-264 

Barak  .  120 

Bathsheba  .  175 

Belshazzar  . 262-264 

Benhadad .  210 

Benhadad  II . 231 

Benjamin  . 49,  51 

Bethany  .  395 

Bethlehem  .  340 

Bethsaida,  Jesus  performs  miracles 

at  .  378 

Bethuel .  40 

447 


44^8 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Bible,  origin  .  9 

Bishops .  434 

Boaz . 143-147 

C 

Caesar  Augustus  .  339 

Caesarea,  Paul  in .  426 

Caiaphas  .  402 

Cain .  17 

Caleb .  95 

Cambyses .  270 

Cana,  marriage  at .  364 

Canaan  (see  Palestine) 

Capernaum  .  367 

Carmel,  Mt . 218 

Chaldea  .  258 

Chaldeans  . 238-241,  257 

Cherith,  Brook  .  217 

Christianity,  beginnings  of . 413-416 

Christians,  earliest  .  419 

in  Rome .  430 

Roman  persecutions .  432 

Church,  establishment  . 428-436 

organisation  .  434 

Corinth,  Paul  in  .  422 

Creation  . 12-25 

Croesus  .  266 

Cyrus  . 256,  264-269 

D 

Damascus  . 231,  232 

Daniel . 258-265,  268 

Darius . 262,  264,  270 

David . 156-181,  195 

Deborah  . 119-122 

DelUah  .  135 

Deluge,  the  .  21 

Dura  .  260 


E 


Ehud .  116 

Elah  .  212 

Elam,  King  of  .  29 

Elders  of  the  church .  434 

Eli  .  139 

Elijah  . 215-227 

Elimelech .  143 

Elisabeth  . 338 

Elisha . 222,  227,  230,  232 

Endor,  witch  of .  168 

Ephesus,  Paul  in .  423 

Ephraimites .  129 

Esau . 41-45,  48 

Essenes  . 311-313,  348 

Esther . 271-274 

Ethnarch  .  319 

Euphrates  River . 3,  4,  25 

Eve  . 16-19 

Exodus  from  Egypt . 72-98 

Ezekiel  . 251-256 

Ezra  . 275 

F 

Famine,  Joseph  and  the .  61 

G 

Gaal  .  127 

Galilee  in  time  of  Jesus . 373 

Gethsemane,  Garden  of .  400 

Gibeon . 107-109 

Gideon  . 124-126 

God,  Jewish  idea  of . 13,  252 

Golden  Calf  .  89 

Golgotha  . 410 

Goliath  . 157-160 

Gospels  . 325-331 

Gospels  written  in  Greek . 332 

Greek  Language,  gospels  written  in  332 
Greeks,  early  relations  with  the  Jews  286 
Hellenistic  era  . 332-334 


Ecclesiastes  . 

. 282 

H 

Eglon  . 

. 115 

Egypt,  Jews  in . 

. 67-82 

Hagar . 

.  34 

Hyksos  dynasty . 

.....  68 

Haggai . 

. 269 

J  oseph  in  . 

. 56-67 

Ham  . 

.  23 

Mary  and  Joseph  escape  to. . 

. 342 

Haman  . 

. 272-274 

INDEX 


449 


Hammurabi .  242 

Hannah  .  139 

Hasideans  .  308 

Hazael  . 231 

Hebrew  Language .  9 

Hermon,  Mt . 231 

Herod  . 331-343 


Herod  Antipas,  Jesus  appears  before  406 


Pharisees  before  .  381 

Herod  Philip . 345,  353 

Herodias . 345,  353 

Herodotus  .  245 

Hezekiah  .  237 

Horeb,  Mt . 221 

Hosea . 231,  233-235 

Hoshea . 236 

Hur .  87 

Hyksos  people  .  69 

Hyrcania  . 293 

Hyrcanus  . 315-318,  320 


I 


Isaac  . 

Isaiah . 

Ishmael  . 

Israel,  Jacob  named 
Israel,  Kingdom  . . . 


.  33 

. . .  .233-236,  251 

.  34 

.  48 

192-195,  201-237 


J 


Jabin .  119 

Jacob . 41-49,  61-56,  62,  67 

Jael  .  121 

J  apheth  .  23 

Jason  .  301 

Jehoahaz  .  232 

Jehoash  .  233 

Jehoram  . 225,  228 

Jehoshaphat  . 214,  224-226 

Jehu . 211,  213,  214,  227-232 

J ephthah  .  128 

Jeremiah . 238,  239 

Jericho  . 100-104 

Jeroboam . 197-199,  209,  233,  235 

Jerusalem  .  30 

Jerusalem  founded .  141 

Jerusalem  in  time  of  Jesus . 387 

Jerusalem,  Jesus  in . 368-372,  390,  394 


Jesse  . 166,  169 

Jesus  appears  before  Herod  Antipas  406 

appears  before  Pilate . 406,  407 

appears  before  the  Sanhedrin....  380 

arrested  .  401 

at  marriage  at  Cana .  364 

baptism  .  352 

betrayal  of . 398-402 

birth  of .  340 

character  of . 357 

condemned  to  death . 404,  409 

crowned  .  410 

crucifixion  .  410 

decides  on  his  mission .  359 

drives  out  the  money-changers  370,  395 

hailed  by  Simeon . 342 

historical  evidence  of . 323-325 

in  Jerusalem . 368-372,  390,  394 

in  Samaria .  374 

in  the  Temple .  351 

in  the  wilderness  . 352,  356 

last  supper  . 400 

meeting  with  John  the  Baptist  352,  362 

miracles  of . 365,  374,  378 

parables  of  .  385 

philosophy  of  . 357 

Pharisees  plot  against  ...376,  378-382 

Sermon  on  the  Mount .  384 

spread  of  his  teachings . 413-416 

teachings  of  . 374,  382,  391 

trial  of .  404 

Jethro  . 75,  87 

Jews,  after  exile  .  388 

captivity . 242-264 

origin  .  6 

return  to  Palestine .  267 

Jezebel  . 213,  218-223,  226,  227-229 

Jezreel  .  222 

Joab  . 171,  174 

Joash  .  124 

Job  .  279 

John  Hyrcanus  .  313 

John  the  Apostle  . 325,  328 

John  the  Baptist  . 348-363,  362 

Jonathan  . 161,  168,  174 

Joram  (see  Jehoram) 

Jordan,  valley  .  29 

Joseph  . 49,  61-67 


450 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Joseph,  father  of  Jesus .  338 

flight  into  Egypt .  342 

Josephus  .  325 

Joshua . 86,  88,  95,  97,  98,  99-112,  269 

Jotham  .  127 

Judaea  divided  between  Herod’s  heirs  344 


Herod’s  rule  in  .  331 

in  time  of  Jesus .  361 

Pontius  Pilate,  procurator  of . 346 

Greek  rule  in  . 285-294 

Roman  rule  in  . 316-320 

Judah,  brother  of  Joseph .  55 

kingdom . 192-195,  201-241 

Judas . 396-402 

Judges  . 113-142 

Justus  of  Tiberias  .  325 


K 

Kaldi  (see  Chaldeans) 


Kingdom  divided . 192-195 

established .  149 


Matthew  . . 

Megiddo . 

Melchizedek . 

Menelaus  . 

Mesha . 

Meshach . 

Messiah,  Jesus  as 

Methuselah  . 

Micah  . 

Micaiah  . 

Michal . 

Midianites  . 

Miracles  of  Jesus 

Miriam  . 

Moabites  . 


. 325,  327 

. 228 

.  30 

.  301 

. 225 

. 260 

. 342,  382 

.  19 

.  122 

. 224 

.  161 

.  123 

365,  375,  378 

.  73 

.  32 


Money-changers  driven  out  by  Jesus 

. 372,  395 

Mordecai  . . . 272-274 

Moses  . 72-98 


N 


Kurus  (see  Cyrus) 


Laban  . 40,  45-48 

Laws,  Mosaic  . 87-93 

Lazarus  .  394 

Leah  . 46,  49,  51 

Levites  .  92 

Lot  .  27 

Lots,  feast  of  (Purim) .  274 

Luke . 325,  328 

Lysias .  425 


M 


Nabal  .  166 

Nabonidus  . 262,  264 

Nabopolassar . 258,  262 

Naboth . 222 

Nadab .  209 

Nahor  .  38 

Naomi . 143-147 

Nathan  .  175 

Nazareth . 338,  343 

Nebuchadnezzar . 238-240,  258-261 

Nectabenus  .  293 

Nehemiah . 275 

Nero,  persecutions  by  .  323 

New  Babylonia  . 258 

New  Testament,  history  of . 323-327 

origin  and  history .  10 


Maccabaeus,  Judas . 

. 305 

Nicodemus  . . . . 

.  372 

Maccabees  . 

. 305-308 

Nineveh  . 

. . . 235,  258 

Machpelah,  cave  of . 

.38,  41,  49,  67 

Noah  . 

. 19-24 

Magi  — . 

.  341 

Man,  creation  of . 

.  16 

0 

Mark  . . 

. 325,  328 

Mary  . 

. 338,  363 

Old  Testament, 

origin  and  history . .  9 

flight  into  Egypt . 

. .  342 

Omri  . 

.  212 

Massacre  of  the  innocents. 

. 342 

Ormuzd  . 

.  290 

Mattathias  . . 

. 303-305 

Othniel  . 

.  114 

INDEX 


461 


P 

Palestine  (Canaan),  Abraham  in.. 27,  51 


conquest  of  . 113-142 

Jews  established  in  . 6,  50 

Jews  return  to . 95,  99-112,  267 

Parables  of  Jesus  .  385 

Paul  baptised .  420 

conversion  of .  419 

early  life  of  .  417 

in  Antioch .  420 

in  Athens  and  Corinth .  421 

in  Caesarea .  426 

in  Ephesus  .  423 

in  Rome .  426 

influence  on  Christianity  .  426 

Jews  persecute  .  421 

missions  of  .  422 

returns  to  Jerusalem  .  424 

Sanhedrin  against .  425 

Pelasgians  .  286 

Peter .  367 

denies  Jesus  .  404 

in  Rome . 430 

missions  of  .  428 

Pharisees  . 307-311,  314-319 

plot  against  Jesus  . .  .376,  378-382,  396 

Pharaoh  of  Egypt . 57,  72-82 

Philippi,  Paul  in  . 422 

Philistines  . 32,  117-137,  157,  167 

Plagues,  great  Egyptian .  79 

Pornpey . 317-320 

Pontius  Pilate . 346,  381,  404,  405 

Potiphar .  56 

Preacher  .  282 

Proverbs  .  281 

Psalms  . 157,  162,  280 

Psalter  .  280 

Ptolemy  Soter  .  294 

Purim,  feast  of  .  274 


R 


Rachel  . 46,  49,  51 

Rahab .  100 

Rebekah .  40 

Red  Sea,  passage  by  Jews  and 

Egyptians  .  82 


Rehoboam . 191,  199 

Rome  at  the  time  of  Jesus . 332-338 

attitude  towards  Christians .  430 

Paul  in .  426 

Peter  in  .  430 

Ruth  . 143-147 


S 


Sadducees . 309,  348 

Salome  .  345 

Samaria . 213,  232,  236,  373 

Samaritans . 237,  267,  269,  373 

Samson  . 130-137 

Samuel  . 139-142,  154-157,  164,  168 

Sanhedrin,  Jesus  before  .  380 

Judas  before . 398 

Paul  and  .  425 

Sarah . 27-38 

S argon  .  237 

Satan  .  291 

Satraps .  266 

Saul  . 148-168 

Seleucids  .  295 

Semitic  Race,  origin .  4 

Sennacherib .  237 

Sermon  on  the  Mount .  384 

Shadrach  .  260 

Shalmaneser  .  236 

Shalmaneser  II  .  231 

Sheba,  Queen  of .  184 

Shechem  . 126,  203 

Shem .  23 

Shemer .  213 

Shishak .  208 

Shulamite  . 283 

Simeon  .  342 

Sinai,  Mt . 84,  87,  90 

Sisera  . 119-122 

Socrates  .  334 

Sodom  and  Gomorrah  . 29-31 

Solomon  . 177,  180-190,  196-198 

Song  of  Songs  .  283 

Syria,  earliest  history  .  4 


T 


Tabernacle  . 92,  172 

Tacitus  .  323 


452 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  BIBLE 


Talmud .  250 

Tatnai . 270 

Tel-Abib  .  253 

Tel-Harsha  .  248 


Temple  at  Jerusalem,  Ezekiel’s  con¬ 


ception  . 254-256 

in  time  of  Jesus .  388 

rebuilt  . 269-270,  275 

Temple,  Solomon’s  . 182-188 

Ten  Commandments  . 88,  91 

Tiglath  Pileser .  235 

Tigris  River . 3,  4 

Tirzah . 204,  209,  212 

Tower  of  Babel .  25 

Tree  of  Knowledge .  17 


U 


Ur  of  the  Chaldeans . 26 

Uriah  .  174 


V 

Vashti . 272 

W 

Woman,  creation  of .  16 

X 


Xerxes 


272 


Z 


Zacharias  .  333 

Zadok  .  255 

Zarathustra .  290 

Zedekiah . 238-240 

Zerubbabel  . 269 

Zimri . 212 

Zion .  187 

Zipporah . 75,  93 

Zoroaster . 290 


PRINTED  BY  VAN  REES  PRESS 
NEW  YORK  CnW 


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